Ruthless Rodgers could lead Celtic to new level of acclaim
NOSTALGIA is rich in the air around Celtic Park at the moment. Three days after the 50th anniversary of the Lisbon Lions on May 25, Henrik Larsson and Lubo Moravcik are due in town to head up a charity game.
By the time a week of historic celebrations is upon us, though, there is every chance the next generation of Celtic supporters will have witnessed something that they will recall well into their dotage.
Because as revered as the sides of Lisbon and Seville are and forever will be, the team Brendan Rodgers has assembled may yet trump them on one count; not just winning the Treble but doing so while unbeaten.
This gutting of Inverness was so ruthless and impressive in every sense that the pertinent question is surely no longer if Rodgers’ side have the wherewithal to pull off the feat. Only — who on earth can stop them?
The length of the Premiership table, and 52 points, may have suggested some kind of mismatch and it certainly was all that.
Richie Foran, the Inverness manager, was generous in his praise of the home side but his assertion that the scoreline slightly flattered them was wide of the mark. Truthfully, it could have been any number.
We can forgive the Dubliner that one. By timeup, his head must have been a blur as Rodgers’ side found new ways to torment his men.
Had the match sponsor commissioned half a dozen man of the match awards, it still might not have been enough.
Mikael Lustig followed up his rabona in Perth with a touch and finish Dennis Bergkamp would have been proud of, the fine assist coming from the toe of Nir Bitton.
Kieran Tierney enhanced his reputation as the best Scottish player of his generation with a flawless contribution which was deservedly capped off with a headed goal while Scott Brown’s crowdpleasing sixth was his just deserts for running the game from start to finish.
Scott Sinclair did everything except score but again made a mockery of his £3million price tag while, on the other flank, James Forrest claimed three assists amid a scintillating display of wing play.
But the show-stealer again was Moussa Dembele. This week Rodgers stated that the 20-yearold will one day be the star attraction in the French national team and frankly that time-frame may soon need revising.
It took him just 14 minutes to wrap up his second hat-trick in seven days but even if he’d failed to find the net there would still have been so much to admire.
For one that’s still learning the game, Dembele’s touch and awareness are something to behold. His third, and Celtic’s fourth of the day, stemmed from him spinning on the half-way line and releasing Forrest with a dead-weight centreto-right pass. Forrest did his part by hitting the byeline and standing the ball up. Dembele’s run was timed to perfection, as was his header.
This much is now apparent; For just £500,000, Celtic have unearthed their best striker since Larsson.
It’s a pity that a bid of upwards of £30m will probably restrict the Frenchman to just one season at Parkhead because a year-on-year comparison with the great Swede would be fascinating.
For the record, Dembele’s 26 goals to date outstrips Larsson’s total of 19 in his debut season — and there is still much football to play.
‘It’s great to have a player like that. You give him a chance and you know he’ll score,’ said Forrest. ‘He can score goals out of nothing as well. He’s a great player and we’re really lucky to have him.
‘He just seems to keep scoring. Even when he’s not been in the game for a while, he gets half a chance and he’ll score with his first touch.
‘When you know things aren’t going your way, if he can get a chance you know he’ll put it away.
‘He’s on 26 now and he could easily hit 40. Hopefully he gets more.’
It’s not just a prolific scoring record and a sublime all-round game that make for comparisons between Dembele and Larsson. The Swede will be admiring from afar the same mental toughness he once had in spades.
An injury lay-off coinciding with fevered speculation of a move to Chelsea might well have derailed Dembele. Six goals in 38 minutes tends to suggest otherwise.
‘It’s not affected him at all,’ said Forrest of Chelsea’s interest. ‘The boys have been giving him a wee bit of stick but he gets on with it.
‘You wouldn’t think he’s only 20 with the way he acts. That’s two hat-tricks in a row now. It’s a huge credit to him and the players around him for creating the chances.
‘His all-round game is improving as well. His link-up play was spot- on today, as were his goals.
‘You could tell as soon as he came in that he was a worker. He’s always in the gym trying to improve himself. He’s not let anything affect him whether that be being linked with other clubs.
‘He’s just focused on playing with Celtic for the rest of the season.’
Bitton’s sumptuous ball over the top to Lustig started the rout on 21 minutes, with the full-back’s touch and finish of the highest order.
Four yellow cards for the visitors in a short burst suggested they weren’t going to go down without a fight but Dembele’s conversion of Forrest’s cut-back on the stroke of half-time — with a little help from Owain Fon-Williams — put the game beyond them.
David Raven’s tackle denied Scott
Sinclair after the interval only to inadvertently set up
Dembele’s second with the Frenchman instigating and finishing the move which soon gave him ownership of the match ball.
Forrest blotted his copybook by failing to hit the target after disposing Brad McKay but redeemed himself by standing up a cross for Tierney’s headed fifth (celebrated, left). Brown’s explosive strike brought up the half dozen, with the Celtic skipper delighting in striking his trademark goal celebration. Rodgers later commended his players for having ‘an attitude which was first-class’ and ominously predicted their football would only get better. ‘You could maybe say the winter break has refreshed us,’ added Forrest. ‘A lot of games came along together (in December), but the last couple of weeks we’ve not had a midweek game as well, so we’ve had the training instead.’
All good things naturally come to an end but with that rest in the tank, a lighter schedule ahead plus players coming back from injury, making a case for Celtic’s 30-game unbeaten domestic run hitting the buffers any time soon is difficult.
By the time Larsson and Moravcik grace the hallowed turf again 24 hours after the Scottish Cup Final, it’s entirely possible that they too will be witnesses to history.
‘So far we’ve won the League Cup and have done really well in the league. It still seems a long way away,’ added Forrest.
‘But someone is going to need to play at their best to beat us. We have had off days as well when we’ve had to grind out results.’