Former Celtic manager Gordon Strachan used the Hoops’ win at St Johnstone to have a pop at plastic pitches.
Neil Lennon’s battlers were in a real game this afternoon. For large spells, Saints managed to restrict us in the Scottish Cup tie. Odsonne Edouard and Leigh Griffiths weren’t linking up well, whilst the midfield struggled to dominate given the blistering conditions.
St Johnstone had chances of their own that could’ve seen the game go differently. Drey Wright and Callum Hendry both had positive openings, whilst Stevie May was a constant menace to our defence.
However, speaking on Premier Sports, Strachan used the game to highlight how plastic turfs couldn’t hold such an entertaining 90 minutes. Premier Sports published the video on their official Twitter account, which you can watch below:
“I thought both sides were terrific. I came here today and I was driving here in the wind and rain thinking ‘this is going to be horrible, the atmosphere’s going to be horrible’. Couldn’t have been any different, it was fantastic.
“The pitch made it a great game, the players’ skill made it a great game, the determination of everyone on the pitch made it a great game. And the referee allowed it to be a great game as well.
“And I’ve got to say you would never have seen a game like that on a plastic pitch. I’ll just get that off my chest right away. That was real football – real men’s football.”
Let’s see the difference
We’ll be able to see the difference first hand this week as Celtic take a trip to West Lothian to face Livingston. The Tony Macaroni Arena is one of three pitches in the top flight containing astroturf. The others are Hamilton’s New Douglas Park and Kilmarnock’s Rugby Park.
Celtic have struggled massively at Livingston since they’ve returned to the Premiership. In our two trips there since their promotion, we’ve failed to win, with one defeat and one draw on our record.
But Strachan is spot on. On a drenched astroturf surface, the players would’ve been struggling to get any coherent passing moves going. Whilst today wasn’t great in terms of the conditions, the ball still moved well on the grass. Passes weren’t noticeably slowing up or sticking to the turf.
It’s also a sign of just how much the former Scotland and Celtic boss is against plastic pitches. It’s great to have such high-profile figures in Scottish football speaking out against them. It’s time they were banned from the top league, regardless of whether it saves clubs a bit of money.
St Johnstone, to their credit, managed to keep the pitch more than playable this afternoon. The conditions made it more of a battle, but that’s just the way it goes in Scottish football when the weather is against you. Players would much rather be playing on that as opposed to a sun-kissed plastic pitch.
So it’s great to see Strachan send out his anti-astro message today. The more people against them, the better a chance we’ll have of ridding them from our game.
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