Celtic’s adventures in the Champions League just got a lot more interesting after the 3-1 win over RB Leipzig last night.
Celtic’s defeat of the Bundesliga club means that Brendan Rodgers is on course to take the Parkhead club out of the league phase for the first time since Neil Lennon did it in 2013.
However, it’s what Gordon Strachan managed with Celtic almost 20 years ago that has come to light after the RB Leipzig result last night that Rodgers needs some credit for.
After getting stick from many in the media after the Borussia Dortmund result, Rodgers has equalled a 14-year record set by Strachan in Europe’s top competition.
Brendan Rodgers equals Gordon Strachan’s Champions League Celtic record vs RB Leipzig
Gordon Strachan’s record in the Champions League for Celtic was excellent at the beginning of his Parkhead career.
The first manager to take Celtic out of the group stages, Strachan’s Hoops took care of the likes of Manchester United, Benfica and FC Copenhagen in 2006/07.
However, the last time Celtic won three home games in a row was in 2007/08 as excellent social media account Scotland’s Coefficient points out here:
The post read, “A humongous result for Celtic🍀 who have now won three Champions League games in a row at Celtic Park (2-1 Vs Feyenoord, 5-1 Vs Slovan Bratislava and 3-1 Vs RB Leipzig for the first time since 2007/08 under Gordon Strachan (2-1 Vs AC Milan 1-0 Vs Benfica, 2-1 Vs Shakhtar)
“🧮 Another 0.4 points added to Scotland’s Coefficient to take our total to 4.8 points! The 2.2 points Celtic have added is the most since 2019/20 (4.125 points)”
The only other Champions League game Celtic have avoided defeat after going behind
As every Celtic fan knows, the club’s record in the Champions League doesn’t exactly make good reading, especially if the opposition takes the lead.
In 29 games where Celtic have gone behind, 27 of those fixtures have ended in defeat for the Parkhead club.
The only time, apart from against RB Leipzig, Celtic have salvaged a result was against Borussia Monchengladbach in 2016 when Rodgers’ Hoops battled back from 1-0 down after Moussa Dembele’s 76th-minute equaliser cancelled out Lars Stindl’s first-half opener.
It does look like Celtic are on the up in Europe and not many teams will fancy coming to Parkhead after watching the demolition of RB Leipzig last night.
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