Celtic escaped Romania with a 1-1 draw last night at Romanian Champions Cluj’s Dr. Constantin Rădulescu stadium.
We actually started pretty brightly and in the opening minutes, Edouard had a decent effort from distance saved by Cluj keeper Giedrius Arlauskis though for a split second it looked like he might fumble it over the line.
Thereafter the game fell into a malaise. Cluj aren’t the prettiest team to watch punting loads of balls into the air – a lot of head tennis was going on all night- being direct and trying to hit us on the break.
It paid off just before the half-hour mark though when they broke from one of our corners and tore down our left side which was a problem all night. Lewis Morgan got taken to the cleaners by Ciprian Deac and he released Mario Rondón who ghosted in behind Boli Bolingoli and placed the ball through the legs of Scott Bain to give the hosts the lead.
At that point, you feared the worst with Boli having a bit of nightmare at left-back and Morgan proving highly ineffective up the same flank. Morgan still has time to develop but his priority always seems to go to ground as opposed to beating an opponent and his final ball is generally poor with his crosses often failing to beat the first man or make it even remotely close to another Celtic player.
Morgan was only starting because of a prematch injury to the inform Mikey Johnston and he’ll be a certainty to be pitched back int there once he shakes off his fitness issues.
Down the other flank, we were fairing much better with new signing Hatem Elhamed showing lots of promise and he fed James Forrest in the box on 37 minutes with winger leading the Cluj defence a merry dance before clipping it into the net off the post for a precious away goal and vital equaliser.
The goal pretty much came out of nowhere and was a welcome relief.
In the second half, Cluj came out of the blocks fast and we got a large slice of luck on 50 mins when a corner kick came in only to be scooped towards his own goal by Scott Brown but keeper Bain saved before Boli showed some composure and cleared.
There were a few half chances thereafter with Bain using some pretty unconventional goalkeeping to keep out a shot from on 70 mins from Paun Alexandru that almost caused panic in the box and Celtic themselves had quite a few breakaway opportunities in the final ten mins but generally showed poor, likely fatigued decision making. Both Forrest and Edouard had decent chances but both’s efforts ended up wide.
Mateo Susic should have seen red late on for a wild challenge on Brown but got away with it and the game ended 1-1 which we’d have taken in a heartbeat before kick-off.
Cluj are no mugs and look dangerous on the break and are clearly combative, physical and direct. But they also look very beatable.
It’ll be a difficult home tie next Tuesday but we’re in the driving seat now and hopefully will get the job done.
Meanwhile off the field word filtered through that Celtic had agreed a £25 million fee with Arsenal for Kieran Tierney in what must be the worst kept secret of the summer. Scott Sinclair was also not part of the travelling party with rumours intensifying that’s he’ll be returning down south. I guess we’ll get confirmation on both fronts by 5pm today as that’s when the English transfer window slams shut.
You’d have to imagine that if both deals go through then we can expect some serious spending between now and September 2nd (when our transfer window closes) when you consider the squad will have seen 14 departures with only four coming in thus far.
But it’s all ifs, buts and maybes at the moment. One thing’s for sure the market will become far more realistic when the English are taken out of the equation.
Now we move onto Motherwell away at 12pm on Saturday. Their own squad was hit by the losses of the likes of Chris Cadden, Jake Hastie, captain Carl McHugh and Curtis Main this summer with 14 departures in total when you included loanees. They have though added ten new first-team additions and scored goals galore in the League Cup over the summer winning four from four group games, scoring 13 with none conceded though the opposition was Annan, Dumbarton, Morton and Queen of the South. They started off their league campaign with a 0-0 draw at Livingston which is always a tough place to visit.
Watching on from the stands will be the recuperating David Turnbull who so nearly became our player this summer before a medical scuppered a £3.25 million move. Who knows come January or next summer maybe he still will end up in the hopes when fully recovered and back to playing.
The match has the potential to be a pretty open game with Stephen Robinson’s men likely being set out to try and go at us hard and fast early and test our potentially weary legs after our exploits last night.
It’s a 12pm kick-off on Saturday so there’s not much recovery time but hopefully, the likes of Jullien, Shved and Griffiths are utilised to add some freshness to the team after the pretty draining conditions experienced in Transylvania.
See what I did there?
....Always A Tim! 