The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Dens fright night as Hoops run riot
DUNDEE 0 CELTIC 5: McIntyre disappointed by passive Dee display
Dundee boss Jim McIntyre accused his players of being too passive as they were steamrollered 5-0 at Dens by Celtic last night.
The bottom-of-the-table Dark Blues were undone by goals from Tom Rogic, a Scott Sinclair penalty and then three more by James Forrest, Odsonne Edouard and Ryan Christie.
Dundee didn’t lay a glove on Brendan Rodgers’ side, with McIntyre admitting it simply wasn’t good enough.
The manager said: “We were too passive. Our game plan was to make sure we sat off Celtic in their half and try to counter-attack. We know how they like to flood forward, especially their full-backs. But we had to make contact in their half.”
McIntyre continued: “I thought for the first 13 minutes we did that but at Rogic’s goal we had a man there and we give four or five yards away.
“It is too much with his quality but you have to say what a finish – it is unbelievable. That is what we are talking about though, we have to have contact on the ball.
“The second goal is not a penalty. It is a poor decision but we don’t even claim.
“We should be hounding the referee and I don’t see that. All we do is ask instead of hounding him.
“Two of the other three goals are midfield runners. It is great Celtic play from their point of view but it is not good enough from my team.
“It is haemorrhaging the confidence. “It is a bit fragile just now with the confidence levels which is to be expected.
“But nobody is going to help us, we are going to have to do it ourselves.
“They will get all the encouragement that is needed from me and my staff to keep trying to do the right things but we need to help ourselves and at the moment we are not doing that in any of the three games I have been in charge.”
With Dundee having a vitally important game at Motherwell on Saturday, McIntyre insisted the players cannot feel sorry for themselves after the Celtic defeat.
He said: “No, and they won’t be allowed to. We have to be better than what we were and we can’t be as passive as that in any game.
“But they won’t be judged against what we were playing tonight.
“The next two games are a chance for us to move off the bottom of the table.”
Hoops boss Brendan Rodgers was delighted as his side closed the gap on leaders Hearts after scoring what he classed as “wonderful goals.”
He told the BBC: “It’s about getting back to how we know we can play, and we’re starting to see that now.
“The creativity, the scoring of goals, but also not conceding any. The level of our game is definitely improving.
“Our technical level in the game was very high. Good movement, good combination play.”
Rodgers confirmed that debutant Daniel Arzani was being sent for a scan after being stretchered off injured.