DMAA

This is big for me too. Jack is brilliant in games like this. They have replaced Brown with Soro who, to me, looks a very good player. I think he has the potential to emerge as one of their best players, though it is early days. Turnbull and Griffiths have come in and they have both improved their 11 too. That’s not to say we have anything to fear. They have weaknesses throughout their squad but especially across the back 4. But I do think some are getting carried away taking it as a given that we will hammer them.

With a couple more old firms to come I think it would be an acceptable result.

That’s because most of us don’t follow Celtic very closely. They are playing different players and a different formation than they were during their slump. Soro is a major improvement over Brown and Turnbull seems to be a pretty big improvement over Rogic at least at the moment. Griffiths has finally had a run in the team and is clicking with Edouard. Meanwhile our form has dipped quite a bit. I expect a close game.

Helander for me and Aribo playing in the midfield 3 and Hagi in the forward 3. I do feel a wee bit worried without Ryan Jack or even Arfield in the midfield 3 for this game as they probably provide us with more than Aribo defensively.

I can hardly be accused of bias for saying I think Hagi has earned the shirt. That accusation would be more valid in the other direction, people being biased towards him. I see a lot of people saying Hagi is a certainty to drop out for Kent/Morelos and the reasons aren’t to do with current form and performances.

Gerrard hasn’t picked his team yet

There’s Morelos too though. Has he earned a place over Hagi? Not for me, especially with how well Roofe has played centrally.

We shouldn’t be dropping players who have clearly earned the shirt for reputations.

Only got to listen to most of the game today so I’m still to see it. But that is now 5 goal contributions for Hagi in 4 games/3 starts (including his shot which was spilled for Roofe to score). These last four games have been very difficult games where we haven’t been at our best and goals and assists haven’t been as easy to come by as at other times of the season and he has still delivered consistently with contributions that have directly resulted in a goal. That’s is the attacking midfielders job, first and foremost. Hopefully he keeps his place for Celtic.

Happy with that team. It’s very rare for Gerrard to drop Kent so that is interesting. This is a strong team we are starting with which suggests there will be no complacency this time. Big game.

Cheap penalties are ruining the game.

I thought the real potentially game changing moments came from Roofe, Aribo and Hagi. Kamara played a part in some goos moves. I voted Aribo because I thought it was primarily his quality that got us into very good positions.

Another win so I’m delighted. Another game and goal for Hagi too which is great after he had been pretty much frozen out for months which I still find hard to understand. Morelos looked hungry when he came on and he did well, but probably should have scored again. Aribo was really good too. He adds so much creativity and quality to our team. I’m tired of talking about Kent tbh, he has some qualities but loses the ball so much and doesn’t cause the opposition back-line the problems others do so I just don’t don’t see him as the stick-on starter, full 90 minutes player Gerrard seems to.

Yeh that’s what pretty much what I see.

Scott Nisbet is an excellent finisher

He’s been better than Kent, even before the goal. Great play from Roofe and delighted for Hagi. Hagi always looks a threat even when he’s not involved as much as you’d want. One of reasons for that is that he doesn’t drop as deep as Kent.

That’s the team I wanted to see, a bit disappointed with Helander dropping out though. I was really hopefully he was going to be fit enough to play against Celtic because I think he’s the better defender. It will be interesting to see if he gets minutes today.

Not long since the last one to be fair, 6-1 in August 2019.

Gerrard’s selection will be very interesting today, particularly in terms of what he does with the CF/Morelos situation. A start for Morelos today would indicate he plans to start him against Celtic. After Roofe’s performance at CF during the week, and the performance of Hagi, I think Hagi has put himself in contention and I hope to see a similar starting 11 today.

Absolutely. With Roofe up top, Aribo, Hagi and Kamara behind you have so much technical quality there, players who are so good at quick pass and move football. That’s the football I love to watch. Arfield is also very good at this.

I think far too much is made of this, I don’t believe any of our forwards hide and sometimes Kent “not hiding” involves him coming way too deep to pass the ball about. What he is very good at is the off the ball stuff, like the way he won the ball before we scored the first goal. But I certainly don’t think he deserves to be in the “starts every game” category, you should be impacting the result a lot more to be in that category.

He had a few poor moments, but I thought aside from his involvement in the goals he still did very well for spells in the first half in particular. He takes the ball to feet in tight spaces very well and his link up play can be brilliant. He would have had the assist if the season if a goal had come from that flick.

Clark was every bit as bad as this chart predicted. Hilarious that he got man of the match at parkhead.

Finished the whole game now. An excellent win and several very good performances got us there. The win was tied up early and we dropped down to first gear for the rest of the game really. I didn’t expect it to be quite so easy but it wouldn’t have been if not for Aribo and Hagi. Morelos taking that chance would have been the icing on the cake because it was a gift, but for me the gaffer should be seriously thinking about giving others a chance going into this old firm game, the competition is very strong and Hagi’s involvement in two goals as well as some very good build up play should stand him in good stead. Itten and Arfield should also be in contention.