John Hartson says Celtic star isn’t a ‘top-class’ player despite Brendan Rodgers’ comments

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Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers has been pretty vocal of late.

Thankfully, Celtic are flying high in the league and are heading towards another possible Treble campaign under their returning manager.

Rodgers has been dominant in Scotland before, and to nobody’s surprise, he is doing it again, as you sense the best is yet to come.

But what has perhaps surprised some is the Celtic manager’s recent comments in the media that have sparked and generated a few interesting debates.

It all stems from Celtic’s win over St Mirren on Sunday and the supporters expressing frustration at the style of play that seemed to have annoyed the boss.

Not only did he take exception to that post-match, but he was also critical of those inside Parkhead for chanting for Kieran Tierney because he deemed it disrespectful towards Greg Taylor.

John Hartson says Greg Taylor isn’t a ‘top-class’ player for Celtic

Not many will argue that Tierney is a better player than Taylor, but that doesn’t mean that the latter still can’t be a strong performer for the club.

Rodgers stated that Taylor has been ‘absolutely amazing’ and has rightfully lauded his player, as well as defended him, even though he didn’t need protecting because the fans weren’t disrespecting him.

But despite the noise around Celtic’s starting left-back, whilst John Hartson appreciates him as a player, he doesn’t feel he’s at that high-class level, as he told Go Radio.

“Greg is a good player, I wouldn’t say that he is a fantastic, top-class player,” said Hartson.

“I think the fans look at Alistair Johnston on the right-hand side and I think Greg has done ever so well to get to 200 games. Brendan is right, he has been consistent.

“I think sometimes, he gets exposed on the back post. Earlier on in his Celtic career, and he has improved on this, his final ball wasn’t good enough. I give him a lot of credit because he plays and is consistent. But there are a couple of things in his game that get called upon by supporters.”

Taylor’s stats for Celtic this season

Celtic beat Dundee United 2-0 on Wednesday evening to move 16 points clear at the top of the Premiership table.

Taylor made his 200th appearance for Celtic during that match and he will be hoping there are many more to come, even though his contract situation is yet to be resolved.

This season, WhoScored have rated Taylor’s performances in the Premiership at 7.20 and a respectable 6.44 in the Champions League.