Can’t call title after 7 games

instead they allowed Liel Abada’s 16th-minute opener to be cancelled out almost immediately by Ian Harkes as the Tangerines snatched their first point from Parkhead in eight years.

The results leaves Celtic back in sixth.

But Postecoglou said: “It’s a weird league. You call things early here, don’t you? It’s quite remarkable that seven games in people are calling the title already. It’s just not how I work.

“I’m not pulling up stumps after seven games just because other people seem to think there’s some sort of insurmountable challenge out there for us.

“If we weren’t playing well, if we were struggling through things, then by all means I’d be looking at things a lot differently.

“With the efforts we’re putting in at the moment, and the football we’re playing, and the chances we’re creating, and what we’ve got to come back into the team, I just see it totally differently.

“Obviously very disappointing in terms of the effort the players put in and the chances we created. It certainly warranted us getting the points but in the end unfortunately we couldn’t put the ball in the back of the net.

“The players are disappointed but as I said to them, the result is on me. The performance level they put in with three games in a week without changing the team too much, not just this week but right through this period, right to the end there they were still giving everything and still creating chances.

“I couldn’t praise them highly enough for the efforts they put in. Okay, we didn’t get the win we wanted but they gave everything they could.”

Postecoglou suffered a fresh fitness headache as Josip Juranovic limped off with a tight hamstring after just 25 minutes while James McCarthy had to be replaced at the break after taking a couple of whacks.

The pressure is piling on the Parkhead boss – whose side struck the bar three times – but he said: “I know people are wanting to push me on some kind of edge of the ledge somewhere – it’s just not going to happen.

“I don’t worry about those things. I look at how my team is playing and what we’re trying to create. I know what the club is about, I know what the expectations are. I believe the road we have started on will get us there so we will just keep going.”

United remain a point in front of Celtic after their deserved draw but Tam Courts felt his team should have had a firsthalf penalty after seeing Cameron Carter-Vickers barge over Nicky Clark.

The United boss said: “I have contrasting emotions just now. First and foremost I’m really proud of the players for their bravery to come here and put on a performance like that.

“But I’m also slightly frustrated because in the first half we were denied a stonewall penalty.

“I accept that Celtic had a couple of chances and hit the woodwork but I thought we probably just merited the three points on the balance of play.

“I’m standing diagonally behind the incident and I can see there’s a barge on the back. It’s a huge call at a huge stadium with a lot of fans here.

“Also, the referee might have had to produce a red card.

“For whatever reason he has decided not to award the penalty.

“I will show a bit of professional decorum but I’m really expecting better from the officials.”