Champs Celtic are gifted goals
Battling Accies rue errors by stand-in keeper Fulton
Celtic ran out 3-0 winners against Hamilton in what would prove to be Martin Canning’s last game in charge of the Lanarkshire club.
Obviously Accies went into the game as massive underdogs against a highscoring Celtic side, but they actually did quite well, frustrating the champions for long spells and having chances of their own.
However, and it’s cruel to reflect on it, they were badly let down by two errors by back-up goalkeeper Ryan Fulton.
The former Liverpool kid made some stunning saves to keep Celtic at bay, but shortly before half-time he let an innocuous-looking daisy-cutter from Callum Mcgregor rip through him and into the net.
In the second half he parried a harmless cross from Mikael Lustig right into the path of Ryan Christie – and he didn’t refuse the gift.
Lustig then crossed again for Scott Sinclair to head in at the back post. The damage was done.
Hamilton had chances – Tony Andreu should have done better than stab a shot past the left post just ahead of the interval, and in the second Hamilton last won at Celtic Park in October 2014. They’ve lost all seven since, scoring twice and losing 18 goals Reegan Mimnaugh making his debut at 17. He’s the latest to come off the conveyor belt at Accies. half only a last-gasp saving tackle by Kristoffer Ajer prevented Steven Boyd from levelling in 77 minutes. Four minutes later, Celtic scored their second goal and that was pretty much that. It’s a shame for Fulton but that is the life of a footballer. If you lose the ball in midfield you can recover from it, but if you make a mistake as a keeper, it’s almost always going to end up in the net. You do have to give credit to Celtic as well though. While they maybe weren’t at their best, they still created plenty of chances. It’s fair to say that without Fulton, Hamilton could have been hammered by pretty much any scoreline – again, the life of a goalkeeper. Club captain Dougie Imrie had some words of comfort for his stricken team-mate, who is covering for injured Gary Woods. Imrie said: “We did really well to nullify Celtic, tried to stop them going through the middle, make them go wide and put crosses in, and I thought Ryan Fulton’s two blunders probably didn’t lead to Celtic winning but didn’t help Accies. we defended really well, to a man. Up until the goal we were excellent.
“To be fair, I thought we were excellent in the game. I know it’s 3-0, but the two goals could have been stopped.
“If that’s a striker who misses it from three yards nothing is said, they just say it’s a bad miss.
“It’s just the position Ryan plays – if you make a mistake there you’re getting criticised and punished, and the full thing is being scrutinised constantly.
“We’ll turn up in training and get him going again. Ryan knows himself that he has had the worst week of his life, but that’s just part and parcel of the game.” CELTIC: HAMILTON