SIGNS and omens can have such a heavy presence in football, particularly when a league championship is on the line, that going to a match sometimes feels like stumbling into a pit of superstition.
Many Celtic supporters looking anxiously for portents of an end to the curse that seemed to have descended on their team during the recent series of set-backs that threatened to end their challenge for a third successive title would have been convinc
ed that they were to be seen in the 4-1 victory over Motherwell at Fir Park eight days ago.
The rest would, in all likelihood, reflect on the 2-1 triumph over their "bogey" opponents, Rangers, last Wednesday – especially given the timing of Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink's winning goal in the fourth minute of stoppage time – as unmistakable evidence that the hex had been lifted.
Solid contenders as those outings were, they would not compare with this latest visit of Aberdeen. What distinguishes this third leg of the winning treble from the first two is that the three points were secured despite Gordon Strachan's side producing their least impressive – and, even more significantly, their least deserving – performance of the series. This was a match which, only two weeks ago, Celtic would almost certainly have lost.
The clue, as always, is in the details. Aberdeen's first attempt at goal – indeed, just about their only one during a first half of seemingly endless tedium – was a powerful 25-yard drive from their captain, Scott Severin, which flew past Artur Boruc, the ball striking the inside of the goalkeeper's right post, hurtling across the goal line, bouncing off his other post and landing in his arms. In eerily similar circumstances at the same ground last month, Aberdeen scored the goal that eliminated Celtic from the quarter-finals of the Scottish Cup.
Conversely, the home side's goal was delivered by arguably the most frustrating and generally ineffective player on the field, Georgios Samaras. The often lumbering, unconvincing striker, who had taken the place of the injured Vennegoor of Hesselink in the starting line-up, was a source of deep irritation to an increasingly nervous home support before Barry Robson's perfectly measured free kick from the right gave him an unmissable chance from six yards, requiring only to make contact with his head to send the ball over the line.
But nothing in the game would be as riveting as the unbridled savaging of the referee, Iain Brines, by Zander Diamond, soon after the final whistle. As the Aberdeen defender, like a bee hopping from flower to flower, moved from one insult to the next, we were allowed, for a few blissful minutes, to forget the drudgery of the previous 90 minutes.
For Diamond, there will be nothing blissful about the consequences of his outburst, which will bring disciplinary action against the player by the SFA. The big defender's verbal mauling was prompted by the referee's decision – in tandem with a raised flag by the standside linesman, Keith Sorbie – to disallow the late goal with which Diamond seemed to have given Aberdeen an equaliser.
Brines, it should be said, whistled for a free kick to Celtic well before Diamond buried the ball behind Boruc and signalled a handball offence. From the stands, it was impossible to see what had occurred and, without access to a TV replay – the curse of the modern-day "live" reporter – to make a judgment.
Jimmy Calderwood, the Aberdeen manager, and Diamond both said they had been told that Brines had held the defender culpable, and both argued that was impossible, as he had headed the ball on to Barry Nicholson. To other witnesses, it seemed more likely that Nicholson may have used an arm to knock the ball back to Diamond, who then drove it into the net.
"I don't know how Brines thinks I could have handled the ball, but that just sums him up," Diamond began. "If he is one of Scotland's top officials, we are in trouble. At one point, he told me to leave the field because I was bleeding from the mouth. But, if he's seen blood, surely he should stop the game and then order me to leave.
"The play was going on when he told me to leave. But if I go off at that point and we lose a goal while I'm on my way, who's to blame for that? I'm sure the rule says he should stop play, but I don't know what rule he was reading. I don't know how he could have given handball against me when I scored. I asked Barry if it was him, because the ball was near his arm, but he said the ref had given it against me. That just bemuses me."
Whatever happened, the moment appeared to underline the sudden change in Celtic's fortunes, indicating that the ball is now running for them. Excepting the reliably dashing and teasing Aiden McGeady, there was about Strachan's side a general sluggishness and untidiness that is quite common and entirely predictable in the outing immediately following the kind of mental and physical demands made by the Old Firm match three days earlier.
Strachan would not be helped, either, by the unavailability of the injured trio, Paul Hartley, Vennegoor of Hesselink and Lee Naylor. Bobo Balde was a competent replacement for the suspended Gary Caldwell, but Mark Wilson looks less comfortable in Naylor's position of left-back, Massimo Donati is an inadequate deputy for the forceful Hartley and Samaras, despite his goal, could not compensate for Vennegoor of Hesselink's absence. In terms of the championship, and Sunday's crucial renewal of the Old Firm fixture – again at Parkhead – the significance of this latest scare is that Celtic should have come through undamaged.
The full article contains 975 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
