Celtic manager Ange Postecoglou has admitted he isn’t a fan of the timewasting tactics that were deployed by Bodo/Glimt at Parkhead on Thursday night, but he does understand them.
The Hoops came up disappointingly short against the Norwegian champions at Celtic Park several days ago. Indeed, the 3-1 Europa Conference League last-32 first-leg defeat brought Ange’s men crashing right back down to earth.
The Hoops were 1-0 down at the break, and it allowed Bodo to frustrate the Celtic support by consistently looking to timewaste. The Norwegians had players down at every opportunity whilst they also looked to frustrate by doing a prolonged huddle after Celtic pulled a goal back.
And whilst Postecoglou admitted that he understands why they behaved in the manner they did, he insisted that it isn’t a way he would encourage his side to play.
As quoted by the Scotsman, Ange said: “It is part of football and not something I encourage my teams to do, but you understand why oppositions do that, it kills a bit of time. It always amuses me when the referees say they are going to add time and it never really happens.
“Yeah it was a bit unusual [the huddles], but I guess when you are winning you can get away with a bit. We just need to make sure we understand we got here not just from being free-flowing all the time, we have had to grit and grind our way through games. Those kinds of qualities need to be there as well as the football we play.”
Celtic didn’t have the quality to smash through Bodo/Glimt antics
You can understand why Ange was so frustrated with Bodo/Glimt. They were happy to resort to the dark arts and, in truth, it’s not the kind of thing you would expect with Scandinavian sides.
But the truth is it’s probably something Celtic teams have lacked in the past and still do to this day. We don’t have those street smarts that some of our European opposition teams do.
Take the huddles for example. Bodo/Glimt’s huddle at 2-1 totally changed the atmosphere within the stadium. There was a jubilation sweeping around the support after Daizen Maeda had put us back in the game with a fine header. But after seeing Bodo perform their huddle, that turned to an anger and led to us again being frustrated easily.
That’s a more difficult kind of pressure for the players to perform in. And low and behold, we gave the ball away and conceded almost straight away. We simply didn’t have the quality on the night to break through their antics and get a positive result.
The tie isn’t over yet of course. Score the first goal in Norway and it really is game on again. Ange isn’t the kind of manager who’s going to rest players and start prioritising different competitions either. He’ll go for it full pelt at the Aspmyra Stadium.
But if we’re to have any hope of progressing, we’re going to need to show a much different side to us in the second leg.
In other news, The latest on Celtic legend Scott Brown’s managerial ambitions; set for Monday meeting with Goodwin
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