Celtic have the rare luxury of a home 3pm start to get the SPFL campaign back on track again facing promoted Ross County. All have had two weeks to ponder the nightmare at Livingston. Lessons need to be learned.
As I showed in Europe and Plastic Excuses, there is no basis in historical results to say that Celtic perform sub optimally either on artificial surfaces or following European ties (or both in this case). In short, we can’t “blame” the pitch or coming off a European game.
Powers of Recovery
Celtic players left the pitch and (presumably) ended their warm downs at around 22:00 on the Thursday following the win versus CFR Cluj.
Kick off against Livingston was 12:00 on the Sunday. Allowing for a warm up an hour before kick-off, 61 hours had elapsed between ending one tie and physical prep for the next.
This is significantly less that the 72 hours minimum recommended to recover physical capabilities following playing a football match.
From scienceforsport.com, the following highlights recovery from rigours both physical and mental following a typical match.
All players are different physiologically. Some may recover more quickly than others. Lennon decided to make just one change from the Cluj tie – Bauer replaced Elhamed who subsequently was found to be suffering a viral issue.
I would think it unlikely all 9 outfield players would have recovered to the same degree over this period. I would be interested what tests and KPIs Celtic use to assess this.
Specifically, I was surprised Christie started given the exuberance of his performance against Cluj. It was very similar to his career high outing in the win against Leipzig last season. The sheer physical effort would have been immense.
Also, Elyounoussi completed his first 90 minutes for Celtic against Cluj. His last 90-minute outing was on 4th May 2019 away at West Ham United for Southampton. Now, for transparency, I had Elyounoussi as Bhoy of the Match against Livingston, but it was a poor man’s choice. It is surprising he had another 90 minutes in this match.
In summary, and being smart after the event, I am surprised Lennon did not make more changes for the Livingston tie given the lack of recovery time. I said in my preview on A Celtic State of Mind that it was no surprise if Lennon made few changes given the impending International break. However, that is not to say he should have.
A Tired Performance?
Being a player down after 26 minutes clearly impacted the game but Celtic had a similar experience away to Hamilton Academical in winning 3-0 when McGregor was sent off in a similar manner to Christie. With 10 players Celtic still dominated possession and created the better of the chances (xG 1.784 to 1.341).
I posit that the collective lack of optimal conditioning would be more of a factor.
There is considerable circumstantial evidence.
- 72% pass completion is the lowest of the season bar playing that way by design at Ibrox
- 54 pack passes are 14 below average – Celtic were inaccurate in their forward passing
- A season low 8 defenders were taken out with Pack Passes
- Shot Accuracy was 29% against a season average of 38%
- Progressive runs were 22 compared to an average of 38
- On average Celtic win 46% of tackles, it was 36% here
- Celtic win 53% of all challenges (defensive aerial dominance – Ajer and Jullien) but 46% here
- 4 defensive errors compared to a 2.4 average
- 29 possessions won back compared to 36 average
- Lost the ball 12 times in own defensive third compared to 7 average
- 4.52 Passes Per Defensive Action compared to an average 6.67
For the first goal, Celtic’s defence are, frankly, all over the place:
A Comedy of Errors, Lacking Humour
- Ajer has lost the ball in midfield allowing Livingston to break, he does recover
- In typical style, having made a mistake, he is keen to “do something” to rectify – in this case rush out to Crawford vacating space in behind
- Bauer is not alert to the positioning of the other defenders
- McGregor is caught forward
- Brown is not screening the central defence as he has been pulled left
It’s a mess – tired minds and bodies perhaps?
All of this can be associated with sub optimal mental and physical alertness or capability.
Summary
I can show that the pitch and the context of the game following a European match are not predictors of poor Celtic results.
What is clear is that the players selected had insufficient recovery time to be optimally conditioned for this match. Celtic have a large squad and this was perhaps a time to use it based on the physiological monitoring of the players.
I know this reads as being clever after the event, but I do feel there are clear lessons here for next time. That performance was unexpected given the feel-good evolution of Lennon’s squad and the pragmatic yet decisive start to the season.
SteveNaive says
CBN, it is being smart after the event… but it is smart and it is clever. Do you think the physios assess the players readiness to go again 61 hours later? How could you say to a player they weren’t ready and then drop them ? Physiologically correct but possibly very psychologically damaging.
celticbynumbers@btinternet.com says
If they are not monitoring physiological KPIs I’d be stunned and disappointed. A fact based data driven decision should take the emotion out of selection
SteveNaive says
I agree . Why do you think he went again with the same bar Bauer ?
celticbynumbers@btinternet.com says
I suspect because the team played well against Cluj and with the international break there wasn’t another immediate game on the horizon.
JOHN BURNS says
They were bullied, out-thought, out-fought and out-played. Some players earning more in a week than the entire Livingstone squad do in a month. No excuses for this game, or, Hibs. *Rangers will do in the season, what Hibs & Livingstone in the respective games. I fancy *Rangers for the treble. A disgraceful indictment on Celtic as a club, or is it? Celtic always allow *Rangers back in…why?
Forget about player of the season, or, manager of the season – the person who brought Gerrard to Ibrox is the man for all seasons. Gerrard frightened Rodgers away and with it Celtic’s long-term plan.
*Rangers knew that nullifying Rodgers was the key – how clever to bring his old nemises to Ibrox…with the help of Liverpool, Dalglish & all.
celticbynumbers@btinternet.com says
Very bleak John and I always emphasise we should not be complacent.
Celtic have the better squad. The opposition cannot count on men sent off and penalties in every game. All teams will have bad days and drop points. better a wake up call now than in March.
The Cha says
When Rodgers left Celtic had won 7 out of 7 trophies and had established an 8 point lead in little over a month since the winter break, winning 9 straight games and scoring 27 goals and losing only the 1 unsporting 1 to Motherwell.
The latest Rangers revival had been well and truly broken.
I doubt he has any higher opinion of Gerrard than those at Anfield, who by all accounts don’t rate his coaching abilities.
Stop taking the tabloids, they’re injurious to health and seriously impact on brain function!
aldo67 says
I was surprised there were so few changes, I was expecting Hayes and maybe even Sinclair to get a sniff. I never even considered a 61hr recovery time, with that in mind, and 20/20 hindsight, it’s even more of a surprise.
Should have had the internationals on the bench and given some fringe players a chance.
It’s cool that you go to such lengths to understand this stuff, thanks.
Frimpong looked something else yesterday, I have to add. With Hatem (who im a big fan of), Bauer and even Ajer, I’m a bit saddened to say we don’t miss PC Lustig.
Sancheto says
I think Livingston was a pit of a perfect storm in that Celtic were both mentally and physically up to beat Cluj after their previous woeful encounter and it worked as the performance (in a must win game?) was everything we want to see from a Celtic team either in Europe or domestically. However there are downsides in that the players would have been both mentally and physically exhausted after such an high energy/emotional game. This position was then compounded by RC being sent and the remaining players having to dig even deeper into an already depleted physical/emotional well.
I too would have expected NL to have freshened things up a little but, too many changes, as CBN has shown, has also resulted in below par performances under BR & RD.
These are only observations using hindsight/data/science to explain the sub par performance(s) the trick as always is to instigate a plan/process to ensure that we do everything to avoid making the say mistake twice.
Duncan says
The maximum for rotation any winning side should be 3 players.
Not 3 players in one area of the Park either.
The issue with Livingston before a ball is even kicked is the drastic alteration to how we usually play due to a surface that is not conducive to free flowing football being played on the deck.
The game is reduced to a series of long and aerial football due to the horrendous bounce and super slow surface left unwatered as per usual by the home team.
Chuck in an early sending off to a key player,a tough European game several nights previous,aphysical side and a lenient ref and what you you have is a ready made set of circumstances a for a mini disaster.
The difference in play between that away game and the next home game is like comparing shit and sugar.