Livi v Celtic

Well we've just hit a bad week, losing 2 games on the bounce, and Celtic have hit their stride blowing away Hearts in the cup and the league, everything points to a comfortable Celtic win. Just the way we like it really, nobody giving us a chance, lets get right in about them and show them we are not a team to be taken lightly.

I think this is the kind of game where Menga's pace will be useful, giving us an out ball, just hope he does what he did against Sevco and can hit a shot on target to score. At some points i'd love to see Kaja and Menga playing on the wings supplying Hardie with balls in the box, maybe would even work with Hamilton, both have good pace and it would be a nightmare for defenders. Needing to try something different anyway, our set pieces have dried up a bit with everyone knowing how much of a threat we were from them.


………………………………..Kelly


Gallagher...….Halkett………….Lithgow..........Lamie


Kaja......Byrne.......Pittman.......Keaghan.....Menga



.........................Hamilton



Mon Holty, give it a bash.

Playing Celtic on Remembrance Sunday, how did we get so lucky?


Menga's ability to hold players off will be a good asset in this game, could have him drifting out wide and putting the ball in the box. If McMillan's injury isn't bad then probably put him in instead of Lawless, Celtic have hit their form now and we'll need to be at our best defensively. Also important we don't give Rogic any time or space on the ball.

Looking forward to how we match up now we'll likely be playing our strongest set up rather than Kenny Miller's style, will be closing them down more and getting stuck in. Think we'll get a reaction from the last couple games too and keep it tight, would have been more confident if they hadn't started dishing out the thumpings.

Lots of injuries to key players on Thursday please.

2-0 Celtic, FG 20 mins

Don’t know if our closing down was back up to standard yesterday but it was sub standard against St J.
So we need to up our game again to be in with any kind of a chance. It’s a shame they are now up to speed as I’d like to have seen us at our best while they were still in stumbling mode.

We've still got home advantage, we'll see how Celtic like playing on our pitch. Also, I don't think we were as sharp as we've been before the long breaks between games, we only started getting better at the end of the first half against Accies, we should be back up to speed for this game though now we've had 2 games this week.I still fancy our chances against Celtic, we def have the defence and midfield to stifle their attack, and we'll be back to being underestimated I reckon.

If we fail to win; lose or draw this game I'll no be back!

I can only assume the lack of prematch chat is down to a dawning realisation that we could be on the end of a severe pasting on Sunday.

I was very impressed by their win over RBL yesterday, especially to respond so quickly to the equaliser - an equaliser that Leipzig deserved for their 2nd half performance to that point.

They have certainly rediscovered their form & we seem to have gone off the boil in front of goal. Definitely getting very worried about the outcome.

Bertie Bassett wrote:I can only assume the lack of prematch chat is down to a dawning realisation that we could be on the end of a severe pasting on Sunday.

I was very impressed by their win over RBL yesterday, especially to respond so quickly to the equaliser - an equaliser that Leipzig deserved for their 2nd half performance to that point.

They have certainly rediscovered their form & we seem to have gone off the boil in front of goal. Definitely getting very worried about the outcome.

Nope, just nothing new has come up to talk about.

Livi to win 2-1.

Bertie Bassett wrote:I can only assume the lack of prematch chat is down to a dawning realisation that we could be on the end of a severe pasting on Sunday.

I was very impressed by their win over RBL yesterday, especially to respond so quickly to the equaliser - an equaliser that Leipzig deserved for their 2nd half performance to that point.

They have certainly rediscovered their form & we seem to have gone off the boil in front of goal. Definitely getting very worried about the outcome.

Not sure about the severe pasting but I'm having trouble seeing anything other than a loss.

I'm not sure we'll get much joy from the set pieces and our chances of scoring from open play last Saturday looked extremely unlikely. We played well enough and had a couple of shots but it will take a lot more than that to succeed against celtic. Defence wise Lamie; Lithgow; Halkett; Gallagher and McMullen is probably our strongest but it's limited for the counter-attack.

Its difficult to be particularly positive which is a shame because Celtic are probably the side I want to beat the most and maybe a month ago we'd have had a far better chance.

Celtic's defence looks dodgy, we'll score from a set piece against them.

We’ll need to vastly improve our delivery to get anything from set pieces, we failed to threaten St Johnstone from set pieces & the Celtic defence, however dodgy it looks, is better than theirs. Don’t know if we threatened Accies from set pieces but we didn’t score against one of the poorer sides in the league... not confident we can manage that against the best team in the country - not just in name but in current form.

Liviforever wrote:Celtic's defence looks dodgy, we'll score from a set piece against them.

They've kept 8 clean sheets in their last 10 games against Scottish sides. Admittedly haven't watched them or anything but I can't say that sounds very dodgy.

Would still fancy us to get a good chance or two from a set piece. Going between feeling like we're getting a thumping with them being in top form and full of confidence after last night; and being positive that we'll be looking to bounce back, they might be a bit tired and/or complacent.

Like Bertie i was also impressed with Celtics performance last night against the Germans.Leipzig are a quality side and Celtic did so well against them especially in the latter part of the game when their defence was put under so much pressure so kudos to them for getting the result they needed.Yeh set peices are going to be crucial for us if indeed we get any at all.And like the last 2 games if we even get a siff of a chance we really are going to have to make them count against the strongest team in the country imo.Its gonna be another full house Keching! and im not to sure we have it in our loker to upset the applecart in this one.For me its a case of damage limitation unless Celtic have an extremely off day in which case id love the lads to prove me wrong as theve done so many times over the last couple of years.I wish them all the luck in the world and ill be there to cheer them on regardless.Cmon Livi do it?

LiviLion wrote:

Liviforever wrote:Celtic's defence looks dodgy, we'll score from a set piece against them.

They've kept 8 clean sheets in their last 10 games against Scottish sides. Admittedly haven't watched them or anything but I can't say that sounds very dodgy.

Would still fancy us to get a good chance or two from a set piece. Going between feeling like we're getting a thumping with them being in top form and full of confidence after last night; and being positive that we'll be looking to bounce back, they might be a bit tired and/or complacent.

Not against us they haven't, and anytime I watched them in Europe they looked shaky at the back defending set pieces. Can see us giving them problems and scoring.

This is going to another tough one - to be fair we are not expecting any points from this game - this could be the chance to change the team a bit.
Our biggest issue is we do not have an out and out goal scorer - Dolly does well holding the ball but needs someone along side who can finish.

Win - out of this world
Draw - tremendous
Lose - 0-3 still ok - as long as Livi have upped their game from Saints and Accies games.

livikev wrote:This is going to another tough one - to be fair we are not expecting any points from this game -  this could be the chance to change the team a bit.
Our biggest issue is we do not have an out and out goal scorer - Dolly does well holding the ball but needs someone along side who can finish.

Win   - out of this world
Draw - tremendous
Lose  - 0-3 still ok - as long as Livi have upped their game from Saints and Accies games.

LF is expecting us to win!

I agree with your assessment though.

Bertie Bassett wrote:

livikev wrote:This is going to another tough one - to be fair we are not expecting any points from this game -  this could be the chance to change the team a bit.
Our biggest issue is we do not have an out and out goal scorer - Dolly does well holding the ball but needs someone along side who can finish.

Win   - out of this world
Draw - tremendous
Lose  - 0-3 still ok - as long as Livi have upped their game from Saints and Accies games.

LF is expecting us to win!

I agree with your assessment though.

Sure am, isn't anyone in this league I don't think we can beat, esp at home, whether we will or not is another matter.

Notice Rodgers greetin about having to play on plastic pitches, I mean what is the fecking point, there are 3 teams with artificial pitches, he knows that at the start of the season, so stop fecking greetin about it before each game his team have to play on one.

Hilarious too the patter from them, saying they'll have to select players who are able to play on it, ffs, look at the gulf in budgets, one of their players is on more than our whole team and costs millions of pounds, compared to us who paid under 100K for our whole squad. They've got quality players playing no matter who is selected.

Wonder if Raffa and Miller will play in home games, according to all these clubs moaning about our pitch guys like Miller and Raffa wouldn't be able to play on it after being injured (on grass pitches), but apparently it's fine to train on them after being injured.

Getting his excuses in early for when we beat them imo.

Bertie Bassett wrote:We’ll need to vastly improve our delivery to get anything from set pieces, we failed to threaten St Johnstone from set pieces & the Celtic defence, however dodgy it looks, is better than theirs. Don’t know if we threatened Accies from set pieces but we didn’t score against one of the poorer sides in the league... not confident we can manage that against the best team in the country - not just in name but in current form.

No we didn't really threaten Accies at all from set pieces but then again Keaghan wasn't in the team.

A Month or so ago, I was fairly confident of getting something from this and went for a 1-1 draw. Now not so sure now. Apart from the Celtic away game, we have not conceded more than 1 goal in a game, our problem is going to be at the other end though. We really need more cover for the strikers, we really only have Lee Miller, Ryan Hardie, and Jack Hamilton. Dolly and Scott Robinson are really attacking midfielders/wingers.

Celtic had a tough game on Thursday, but winning that game against RB Leipzig shows the run they are currently on, they seem to be scoring for fun against Premiership clubs. Hoping we upset the odds as we have in a few games this season. heart saying draw or livi win. Head saying Celtic win 0-1 or maybe 0-2.

C'mon Livi!!!!

Durnford wrote:

Bertie Bassett wrote:We’ll need to vastly improve our delivery to get anything from set pieces, we failed to threaten St Johnstone from set pieces & the Celtic defence, however dodgy it looks, is better than theirs. Don’t know if we threatened Accies from set pieces but we didn’t score against one of the poorer sides in the league... not confident we can manage that against the best team in the country - not just in name but in current form.

No we didn't really threaten Accies at all from set pieces but then again Keaghan wasn't in the team.

No but his delivery against StJ was below his usual standard... as were the rest of the team tho.

Terrific game I thought & excellent performances from our lads, for me Keaghan was outstanding & while I’ve not seen any replay of it, I thought his yellow card was wrong. He was my MotM but the others were very good too. Kelly made some excellent saves but we also threatened their goal which was very encouraging.

Dolly could be in bother with the compliance officer unfortunately.

Tremendous

Oh ye of little faith, we didn't get a win but a well deserved draw is a cracking result too. Thought we might have nicked it with the scramble in their box but by the end we were running on empty and had to dig deep to get that point, magnificent save by Kelly tipping it over the bar too.

Didn't see what Dolly had done but read a few posts saying he was lucky to stay on the pitch, if so then with the exposure this game will get I can't see him getting away with it, which is going to be a big loss for us against Sevco.

Keaghan's tackle looked spot on, getting the ball, but may have had a scissor movement on their players leg when he followed through. Some team selection too, we had all of our combative midfielders playing today and what a job they did, really liking the look of Lawson now too.

Brilliant point for us, puts us above Hibs into 7th place, just need to gub Sevco at Ibrox in 13 days now. Mon the Lions.

Yeah, now seen Keaghan’s booking, ridiculous IMO. Also, the first challenge that put Menga in to the advertising was worthy of a free kick & arguably a booking.

Menga was silly at the throw in & lucky the ref didn’t see it properly. It wasn’t a bad one, Christie didn’t even hold his face, but he shouldn’t have done it. He will get a ban because he doesn’t play for Scumgers.

Well there  you are,  Livingston must be better than Leipzig.  
That was another battling display from this amazing team.  Celtic threw everything at them in the end but couldn't find a way through. And that's not to say that we spent the game sitting in.  We gave them a few frights too. Hats off to Liam Kelly whose signing in the summer underwhelmed me somewhat.  Happy to be proved wrong.  And what a game from Keaghan. Mention too to Bobby Burns who kept the in form James Forrest quiet all game. What's Dolly like!  He did a great job holding up the ball and generally being a menace and then stupidly attempted to put the heid  on Christie.  It wasn't much more than a brushing of hair on Christie's cheek but the gesture was made and of course caught on camera.  If he gets the expected 2 game ban I'd like to see Jack Hamilton get a chance. Credit to Christie for not doing a Kyle Lafferty.
It was the usual refereeing  performance when you play a big team.  They must get the benefit of the doubt at all times.  Still he must have missed the Menga incident so not so bad.
That was the point we deserved at Hamilton last week so it was more than welcome and lifts us that we bit higher in the table.
On to Ibrox in a fortnight then.  Nae worries.  

This clown is a seething mess about our pitch. https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/celtic-rangers-playing-home-should-13573582