McCann: No malice in Meekings tackle
NEIL McCANN absolved Josh Meekings of any blame after the defender’s clash with Jonny Hayes ended with the Celtic winger being stretchered off at Dens Park. Contesting a loose ball on the halfway line midway through the opening period, the Dundee player cleared his lines before crunching into the Celtic man. Hayes lay stricken on the park for five minutes before being moved, although the initial feeling is he may have avoided a broken leg. Meekings was also unable to continue. Dundee boss McCann felt the incident amounted to nothing more than two committed players going for a ball that was there to be won. ‘It was a nasty tackle but there was no malice in it,’ he said. ‘It was two fully committed guys going for the ball and they both came out of it hurt. ‘I expect my centre-half to be fully committed — and Jonny has gone in the same way. ‘Josh took one on the top of his foot and I think Jonny got it on the shin. ‘It looked and sounded a bad one. It happened so quickly and we wanted the ball kicked out, but it wasn’t. ‘It should have been called straight away because both players were down.’ McCann’s side fell behind in nine minutes to James Forrest’s goal and saw their chances of taking something from the contest vanish when Leigh Griffiths struck just before the break. And the Dundee manager felt his side didn’t do themselves any favours by allowing Celtic the freedom of Dens Park. ‘We lacked a bit of aggression in our play,’ he said. ‘The application and workrate were there but we lacked bite and sat off Celtic. When you do that, they are a real dangerous side. ‘After we lost the first goal — which disappointed me because we talked about how Celtic launch their attacks — we had a little spell. ‘We passed the ball and Celtic were off it again but then we lost a sloppy second goal, it was a terrible one actually. ‘Faissal (El Bakhtaoui) needs to be stronger. It wasn’t a good pass and we give possession away. ‘Celtic then hit us on the counter attack.’ McCann felt his side didn’t ask enough questions of their opponents in the second half. ‘We needed to up the aggression levels in the second half, but we didn’t really do that,’ he said. ‘We maybe lacked a wee bit of belief that we could get into the game. ‘I won’t be too hard on them because we have had three tough games lately. ‘We have one more, then we will get into the winter break.’