Celtic’s form under Brendan Rodgers this season has been inconsistent at best and patchy at worst.
Struggling wins over the likes of Ross County and Hibs have been compounded with lacklustre draws against Aberdeen, Motherwell and Hibs. And we won’t mention the back-to-back losses against Hearts and Kilmarnock.
We get the picture, Celtic have been poor despite what the league table says.
However, against St Mirren, the Celtic manager managed to find a formula that could be a turning point for Celtic this season.
Rodgers tweaked Kyogo Furuhashi‘s role in the team in Paisley and it paid dividends in the 2-0 win. And pundit Gordon Dalziel reckons Rodgers has played a blinder with the £4.6m Celtic man.
Dalziel said [Superscoreboard], “See when you go back to the Kyogo and Idah thing, I thought Brendan Rodgers played that brilliantly and I’ll tell you why.
“Kyogo, for me, is still better playing through the middle. I still think that’s his strongest position because I think he’s brilliant playing on the shoulder.
“But Kyogo has dropped in form, dropped in the goals and what I like Kyogo to do is get more involved in the game.
“Whereas if he was up playing on the shoulder as that lone striker, he wasn’t getting the service and things weren’t going his way, people would be going, ‘Well, he’s off form, he’s not getting the goals, he’s not getting the service’.
“All of a sudden Brendan Rodgers put him into a little bit of a position, where he can get fed when the ball with McGregor or O’Riley. He is getting involved in the game. He looked a lot sharper.
“He proved he can still get goals from that area. I thought it was a terrific move from Brendan Rodgers.”
Rodgers to continue Kyogo in new Celtic role?
A lot will depend on whether or not the Celtic manager has some key personnel returning to the first team.
Reo Hatate must be on the cusp of returning to the first team soon so that would beg the question of whether or not Rodgers would persist in dropping Kyogo into that deeper role within the team.
But for now, I think Rodgers will stick with this system for the visit of Kilmarnock tomorrow and we’ll see the Japanese striker deployed in what is being deemed as his new role.
Anything that can bring out the best in Kyogo at this period of the season should be used as it looks like we will need his goals to ensure the SPFL trophy remains in the Parkhead trophy room at the end of May.
In other news, ‘In the frame’… Crawford Allan says 45-year-old could be referee for huge Celtic vs Rangers clash
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