Celtic 6 St Mirren 0 - A Disappointing Day

 Celtic 6 St Mirren 0 - A Disappointing Day

Dissecting a match in which we were comprehensively outplayed and committed numerous foolish errors does sound like a form of masochism, so please forgive the brevity of this article. Rather than plod through the full game as per usual, I've decided to take inspiration from playing chess on Saturday afternoon against Ross, of @BhoysAnalytics fame (he has over 11K Twitter followers and is one of the best accounts for anyone interested in Celtic, scouting, or Scottish football more broadly). 

Ross might have had the satisfaction of watching his real life team triumph 6-0, and had his fantasy football team trounce mine, but - to prevent his hattrick of victories - I won our chess encounter, despite blundering with my queen. Neither of us understand chess beyond the basic rules, however my mind couldn't help returning to a Rene Maric (Borussia Dortmund assistant coach) piece, which you can read here. The diagram below shows a conceptual idea of how to split the pitch into different segments. 

Credit:Rene Maric. Celtic were exemplary at dominating the vital 'Zone 14' and perennially able to exploit Zones 16 and 18, where the inadequacies of our wingback system showed. See the David Turnbull clip and full explanation below.

In football, as in chess, you want to control the central areas and pin your opponent back. Celtic under Ange Postecoglou do both of these exceptionally well. They were able to manipulate spaces with remarkable ease, primarily with player rotation and line-breaking runs (either through wingers or fullbacks moving to Zones 16/18 or the underlapping wingbacks or central midfielders breaking into Zone 14). This would create take-on or shooting opportunities and, when it did not, would force us deeper and allow an onrushing player to contribute to the next wave of the attack.

It's very tempting to reflect on the match and say "If Power hadn't been sent off, or Jak Alnwick hadn't his first calamitous performance for Saints, it might not have been as bad". Yet, while it is only natural to bemoan both of them - and the egregious officiating error which meant Curtis Main had a goal disallowed - unfortunately, the writing was on the wall early doors.

Take these clips as an example. We have all 11 men on the park, and it is goalless, so we cannot offer up any excuses:

In terms of the game overall, the first segment is a quite remarkable piece of foreshadowing. Tony Ralston plays a brilliant pass (his transformation this season is quite something) and instantly exploits the space behind Tanser. The gap between centre back and wing back was enormous and any team worth their salt would use a quick attacker to take advantage. Celtic's ability to get the ball to 'Zone 16' and 'Zone 18' in such a fashion led to an absurd number of chances centrally, in close proximity to our goal.

Abada would later score the opener after getting the better of Tanser in another duel. On this occasion, rather than attempt to dribble by Shaughnessy and shoot, he gets his head up and spots David Turnbull free centrally on the edge of the box. Despite a superb strike, he hits the woodwork... which probably riled him up, in hindsight. 

Allowing a player of Turnbull's quality to get shots in from this 'Zone 14' is not wise. There is a small article which details some of the academic research which has looked at why this area of the field matters. It does not even touch upon attempts at goal from here specifically (a free central shot from 20 yards is never ideal from a defending standpoint) but does name these 4 key reasons why the zone matters:

• More passes to all zones to the side and ahead of zone 14 [naturally, this will increase the attacking output of a side]
• More forward passes from and within zone 14
• Successful teams make more passes in zone 14 compared with unsuccessful teams
• To generate attempts on goal from possession regained in zone 14

The highlights - or lowlights, depending on your perspective - below show the brilliant combination play Celtic produced in 'zone 14'. Christie and Turnbull were playing as the 8s in the system and made cutting through us look effortless:

In the first instance, ultimately Power was able to block the shot and we had our defenders still in position. However, the alarm bells had to be going off here - perhaps allowing for a time lag while waiting for Jim's stream on Hesgoal to catch up. The second clip was only 12 minutes in; the ease with which Celtic were getting into their passing rhythm, creating multiple high-quality opportunities almost at all, was startling. Of course we can accept they are a team with better individuals, but that doesn't mean anything about the performance or outcome was acceptable.

Once Alan Power makes the rash decision to go steaming into an unnecessary challenge, the resultant red card ruins the contest. Of course, St Mirren ideally would have switched from the 3-5-1-1/5-3-1-1 shape, which simply never worked at any stage. It did not answer the questions Postecoglou posed, chiefly Celtic's ability to rotate positionally - so often a midfielder drops in to allow a fullback to become inverted and pose a problem centrally. The inverted fullbacks could go beyond the wingers, who are strictly instructed to hold the width for most passages of play, and it was never entirely clear who the Saints players were responsible for in these sorts of situations. 

In summation, a repeat of last season's heroics at Parkhead were never likely. Celtic are in the ascendency and, if anything, we actually appear to be regressing. Numerous tactical aspects warrant a full article, certainly, but would be better suited to a more meaningful, less dispiriting encounter. Next up? Similarly winless St Johnstone, who have in Callum Davidson one of the most astute tacticians in the Scottish game. Here's to a better showing then.

'Mon the Buddies.

Thanks for reading,

Lewis.