The fallout continues over Celtic’s 6-0 thrashing of Aberdeen in the League Cup as Willie Miller reacts to what he watched in the Hampden semi-final.
And it’s fair to say, the Aberdeen legend was not happy after watching Celtic beat his old club.
Miller was on co-commentary duty with the BBC and after offering Aberdeen advice prior to the draw at Celtic Park, it seems that he wasn’t too happy that Thelin heeded that at Hampden yesterday.
The former Dons captain urged Jimmy Thelin to change nothing about his tactics when he went to Parkhead in the league.
At that time 67 Hail Hail suggested that that would play into Celtic’s hands and had Brendan Rodgers‘ team taken their chances that day then the game would have been out of sight at half-time.
So when the two sides faced each other again in the biggest game of the season so far, expectations were high that Thelin could pull off a similar if not better result against Celtic especially after Aberdeen beat Rangers on Wednesday night.
Willie Miller rages as Celtic punished Jimmy Thelin’s Aberdeen tactics
Speaking after Celtic beat Aberdeen 6-0, Miller raged after Pat Bonner asked if Thelin tactics were ‘naive’ at Hampden as they were ‘constantly exploited’ as Celtic ran all over the Pittodrie club last night.
Miller said on The Scottish Football Podcast [9m 59s], “I said that though, he’s not going to change. I was surprised that McGrath was playing in a forward position. I mean, he was always in contact with Sokler.
“Now, he wasn’t a threat because Aberdeen had no control of the ball. Okay, McGrath had to take care of trying to get close to McGregor as well, which is a really difficult task.
“But when Aberdeen had the ball and they didn’t have it on too many occasions, then he [McGrath] was up towards Sokler.
“So you had the two wide players, who for me did nothing in the game. So if you’ve got the two wide players playing wide and not really threatening, then all you can expect is that the ball is going to keep coming back.
“You’ve got McGrath who barely touched the ball in the first half, and Sokler was doing nothing. It wasn’t as if that high press was working because the back four were too deep.
“So you’ve got a back four, the two and then a huge gap in between the two centre midfield players and the four forward Aberdeen players that Celtic just constantly exploited.”
How many times Celtic have beaten Aberdeen by six goals or more
Not too long ago 67 Hail Hail had written about Celtic’s biggest wins over Aberdeen in the league but just how many times have the Parkhead club beaten The Dons by six goals or more in all competitions?
Let’s take a look:
Scottish Premiership
16.10.1999: Celtic 7 v 0 Aberdeen
11.12.1999: Aberdeen 0 v 6 Celtic
16.12.2000: Celtic 6 v 0 Aberdeen
03.11.2002: Celtic 7 v 0 Aberdeen
06.11.2010: Celtic 9 v 0 Aberdeen
12.11.2023: Celtic 6 v 0 Aberdeen
Scottish Cup
Celtic have never beaten Aberdeen by six goals or more in the Scottish Cup but have recorded a 4-0 win in the 2011 semi-final, a 3-0 win at the same stage in 2019 and, of course, the 3-3 draw last season in which Celtic eventually went on to win 9-8 on penalties.
Scottish League Cup
Apart from yesterday’s result, the biggest wins Celtic have recorded over Aberdeen in the League Cup are a 4-1 win in the 2011 semi and a 3-0 victory in the 2016 final.
Celtic have a strong hold over Aberdeen domestically and despite their impressive start to this season, it looks like that is going to continue for some time yet.
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