Hibs must be bold and brave to disrupt Celtic today - Tactics Zone preview on Gray's mission to upset odds
Home side can’t be intimidated into simply playing for scraps
Everything you think you know is wrong. A pretty good way to start any piece of opposition analysis, if you think about it.
Because preconceptions have a way of obscuring the objective truth. All of the accepted wisdom about Team X and how to beat them can lull you into some obvious traps.
As David Gray prepares his Hibs side to take on Celtic at Easter Road today, he is fully aware of the threat posed by the reigning champions, current league leaders and – by the admission of all but a few beyond all reason – the most effective and dangerous team in Scotland. His first priority will be stopping the visitors from doing exactly as they damned well please in possession.
So dig in, keep it tight, stay compact and look to hit on the counter? Not a bad plan. But it’s ignoring some of the evidence.
Take a look at Photo 1. If you hadn’t seen the game or have simply forgotten all the details of what happened the Hibs faced Celtic, you might expect this to be a snapshot from the final act of some lightning counter-attack, with the visitors to Celtic Park punishing their hosts for going too gung-ho at the other end.
In fact, Hibs had completed 28 passes – yes, that’s 28 – just to get to this point. The 29th was a cut-back from Lewis Miller that club captain Joe Newell, by his own admission, simply HAD to bury.
Leaving aside the skipper’s miss, what does watching and rewatching this sequence of play tell any good analyst? Namely, that Celtic are as vulnerable as any team to being dragged out of position by opponents good enough to keep the ball – not for a majority of the 90 minutes, but even for a vital 90-second spell.
Ending up with five players crashing the Celtic box is the product of at least three switches of play, multiple decisions to keep the ball rather than forcing something that wasn’t on – and showing the opposition just enough to tempt them into over-committing in pursuit of a turnover. Had Newell found the net instead of blazing over the bar, it would have been a 10/10 no notes example of how to beat even the very best at their own game.
In all of this, of course, we should remember that Celtic won 3-0 on the day. The hosts dominated in every measurable criteria that day, from possession to shots on target. And the array of attacking weapons available to Brendan Rodgers is intimidating, to say the least. More on that later.
But Kasper Schmeichel winning Man of the Match wasn’t without merit. Hibs had chances, from Myko Kuharevich going one-on-one to Newell hitting the stratosphere instead of the target, to hurt the champions on their own turf.
More than once, because Celtic’s front three go so high in possession, Hibs were able to generate two-v-one situations against an exposed fullback with a quick cross-field ball (see Photos 2 and 3).
If Gray can find a way to get Nectar Triantis on the ball in just enough space to pick a pass, and if Hibs can find the right blend between defensive solidity and attacking nous, something that was more than a little off in the mud of Paisley last weekend, they’ll pack some sort of a punch. But, of course, they’ll need to be wary of being flattened themselves.
Forget what happened in Munich. How Celtic played – and how well they played – isn’t really a factor in this domestic contest.
But when Gray spoke about the threat of Daizen Maeda during the week, the gaffer quickly pointed out that he could have singled out any number of potential danger men. The way Celtic line up (see Photo 4) and the talent they possess puts enormous stress on any opposition defence.
When it comes to specifics, well, nobody should sleep on the threat of Adam Idah. Often overlooked because he’s not the now-departed Kyogo Furuhashi, the big man’s movement (see Photo 5 from the thrashing of Dundee) keeps defences stretched.
Jota, whose £8 million return to Celtic Park sparked such celebrations among Hoops fans, is another clear and obvious danger to Hibs. Especially because Rodgers feels confident to use underlapping fullbacks or rampaging midfielders to make diversionary runs, opening up space for the winger to cut back inside and shoot; as Photo 6 shows, you could ALWAYS do with another body in the line against this threat.
Pull someone out of midfield to man the barricades, however, and you allow arguably the smartest player in Scottish football to get especially clever. See Photo 7? That shaded area is Callum McGregor’s office; few have found a way to prevent him from showing up to work on a regular basis.
The challenge is pretty clear, then. Celtic will dominate possession, pummel the back five and generate technical advantages in one-on-one situations. Hibs will have to withstand all of that. And, when they get the ball, make the right decisions.
Sometimes, the counter will be on. But if the situation calls for keeping the ball and backing themselves to play through Celtic? The evidence suggests that’s not quite as illogical as it sounds.