Charlie Mulgrew has an interesting theory for Celtic:
What if you take your most important attacker and move him to a completely different position?
Put that way, it may sound nonsensical, but the logic behind it makes plenty of sense: Celtic are struggling to control the midfield and create chances, and Benjamin Nygren’s role could be causing this.
Nygren has 19 goals this season, ten more than any other Celtic player. So should he move to the troublesome striker position to allow for a more functional midfield?
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Charlie Mulgrew raises Benjamin Nygren role-change as the answer to Celtic’s problem
Speaking on the Go Radio Football Show, Mulgrew said: “It’s simple. I don’t know where we would be without Nygren this year.
“He’s a midfielder, but he’s scored goals like a striker.
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“Cvancara… there’s question marks. He needs two or three chances to even have a chance of scoring. He’s not clinical enough.
“You look at Iheanacho, hopefully he’s fit for Sunday. Well, he is fit, but hopefully he’s fit enough for at least 60 minutes.
“I’m just writing down a couple of options… do you put Nygren up one? Nygren, for me, is a funny one, because I don’t think he offers much to the midfield play. His positioning’s not great; he stands up as a striker.
“So when he stands up there as a striker, I know he’s eager for goals, but it leaves you with two in the midfield area. So suddenly, whoever’s in that two – it was McGregor and Oxlade-Chamberlain – they don’t press with enough intensity from the front, so the midfield get accused of getting over-run in there.
“But when you’re up against three players in there, and maybe four with a strike coming off, it’s really hard to cover that central area when there’s only two of you…
“Back to my point on Nygren: he’s been a brilliant goal-scorer for Celtic this year, but he doesn’t create an awful lot in terms of assists, or take up great positions in order to affect the opposition.
“But you can’t deny that he’s a threat in the box, so I just wonder whether you potentially push him up one, if Iheanacho isn’t fit for 90.”
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Evaluating Charlie Mulgrew’s Benjamin Nygren theory
If more legs in the midfield is what Celtic need, then Arne Engels is the obvious candidate to push Nygren further forward.
But the big unanswered question is simple: can Nygren operate as a striker for Celtic? Martin O’Neill’s men don’t hesitate to go direct, often placing a responsibility on the striker to hold up the play.
Anyone who remembers Nygren’s performance against Roma under Wilfried Nancy will remember that the Swede can be a hard watch with his back to goal.
In the absence of a goal-scoring weapon like him in the team’s midfield, could they lose their route to getting him in those positions in the first place? After all, Engels is no Mesut Ozil, and Reo Hatate has been hot and cold for much of the season.
Either way, it’s an interesting debate.
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