Celtic got back to winning ways after suffering their first loss of the domestic season just before the international break.
Motherwell were competitive and made sure we had to fight for it but it’s 3 points and we remain at the top of the league.
A Matt O’Riley header on 15 mins was well saved by Liam Kelly but it fell to the feet of Kyogo – and to be honest, was probably trickling over the line anyway – who left no doubts and scored his 7th goal of the season.
It should have been wrapped up by halftime but the crossbar kept out a rasping free kick from Josip Juranovic and then later in the half a wonderful Hatate strike from distance smashed off the inside of the post and a diving Kyogo couldn’t convert the rebound.
In-between these two instances Motherwell had equalised though to be truthful they had little to do with it.
A speculative lob into the box was chested back towards goal by Juranovic but unfortunately keeper Joe Hart was already coming out to retrieve the ball himself so it ended up tumbling over the line.
One of those misunderstandings that leads to a freak goal.
Anyway into the second half and it was second time lucky for Hatate as another screamer from over 20 yards out gave Kelly no chance and this time ended up in the bottom corner of the net to restore our lead on 64 mins.
Kyogo should have put the game to bed but fluffed his lines a couple of times with a header from point blank range and after a defence-splitting Turnbull pass had put him through on goal.
The out of nowhere in the dying embers Hatate turned from hero to villain as a hospital pass back to goal put through Ross Tierney to score and captain Callum McGregor was left with no option but to pull the Motherwell attacker down which inevitably resulted in a red card.
We saw the game out though and Abada should have sealed it but all’s well that ends well albeit we will miss captain Callum for our next league game.
Next up is a very testing away trip to RB Leipzig on Wednesday early evening in the Champions League.
....Always A Tim! 