Celtic all ‘dreadful’ in surprise Rangers humbling except single star man
Celtic stars all put in “dreadful” performances in their Old Firm defeat to Rangers except Cameron Carter-Vickers, Tam McManus has claimed.
Travelling to Ibrox on Thursday (2 January) Brendan Rodgers’ side will have been looking for a win that would have put them 17 points clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership table.
Instead, they were deservedly beaten 3-0 with the vast majority of those representing the defending champions performing well below their best.
McManus though, has suggested that Carter-Vickers is one Celtic player who does not deserve the same criticism as the rest for what happened against Rangers.
While taking to social media to give his thoughts on the game, the former Hibernian and Dundee striker turned pundit wrote:
“That was a magnificent Rangers performance and 3-0 flattered Celtic could have been 5 or 6. From start to finish Rangers swarmed all over Celtic. A real shot in the arm for Clement. Yes Celtic were dreadful bar CCV team miles off it but rather give the credit to Rangers.”
Cameron Carter-Vickers won’t take consolation from his performance after Celtic defeat to Rangers
While this was a dismal performance from the vast majority of those in green and white, Carter-Vickers does arguably deserve to take some credit for how he played against Rangers.
The centre-back made some important contributions to keep the score down for Celtic, including with one excellent challenge to deny Hamza Igamane when he was one-on-one in the first half.
Even so, his reaction of frustration at his teammates at how that situation developed suggests he will not care much about his individual effort given the result overall.
It is clear from that just how much this game means to the American international and so he will still be hurting about this result, even if he is not criticised as much as his teammates.
Celtic though must bounce back quickly to ensure they remain on course to retain their Scottish title, having just lifted some of the pressure on Rangers boss Philippe Clement to give them the slightest glimmer of hope.
As a result they will be looking for positives to focus on after a setback such as this, and in Carter-Vickers, they do at least have a source of leadership they can look to going forward.
In other news, Neil Lennon was stunned by comments made by Kris Boyd.
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