The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Postecoglou praises players after hopes ended by Leverkusen
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Ange Postecoglou praised his Celtic players after they went close to pulling off a win away to Bayer Leverkusen.
The Hoops led 2-1 until the 82nd minute but ultimately lost 3-2 to the Bundesliga side as their hopes of Europa League progress were ended by the concession of two late goals in Germany.
They will drop into the Conference League after Christmas, with their sixth and final group match against Real Betis at Celtic Park next month now effectively a dead rubber.
Ange Postecoglou’s spirited side knew they would probably require a win to keep their last-32 dream alive and they were on course for this outcome until the closing stages after a Josip Juranovic penalty and a strike from Jota cancelled out Robert Andrich’s early goal for the hosts.
But Postecoglou was proud of the way Celtic competed against a Leverkusen side he admits are on a different level to his own.
He said: “We kinda hung in there and gave ourselves a chance to pull off a great result but ultimately they’re a good team and we didn’t finish the game off in the way we could have.
“Credit to the players because Leverkusen are a fantastic team and we came to their back yard and gave them a game.
“We weren’t able to control the game the way we wanted because they have quality in their side and they’re always a threat on the counterattack so we had to be a bit wary.
“We hung in there and Joe (Hart) made some good saves.”
Although they have lost three of their five matches so far, Postecoglou has been pleased with the way Celtic have tried to play on the front foot in the Europa League.
He believes they will only get better the more they face top European sides.
West Ham waltzed into the last 16 with a game to spare after a 2-0 victory at Rapid Vienna with goals coming from Andriy Yarmolenko and Mark Noble.
Leicester took control of their Europa League fate with a deserved 3-1 win over Legia Warsaw.
Patson Daka, James Maddison and Wilfred Ndidi sent the Foxes top of Group C ahead of next month’s final game against Napoli.
Tottenham endured one of the most embarrassing nights in their history as they were beaten by the lowestranked team in the Europa Conference League, going down 2-1 to NS Mura in Maribor.
New boss Antonio Conte will have watched on with horror as his side lost at the death to a team with a Uefa coefficient ranking of 341. Spurs Ryan Sessegnon was red-carded.