Gordon in final vow after PSG drubbing
CRAIG GORDON insists Celtic’s seven-goal mauling in Paris will have no impact on Sunday’s Betfred Cup Final against Motherwell. Scotland’s champions were ripped apart by Neymar, Edinson Cavani and Kylian Mbappe in a humbling 7-1 loss in the French capital. With the first domestic silverware of the season up for grabs at Hampden on Sunday, however, Scotland keeper Gordon claims there is no prospect of a Celtic side unbeaten in their last 64 domestic games suffering a Euro hangover. ‘Will Paris affect us for the final? No. Not at all,’ he said. ‘If anything, it will be a positive for Sunday. ‘It’s a cup final and there’s no point going over Wednesday too much. ‘We have a few days’ recovery and then get back to training to organise for Motherwell. ‘I don’t think it will have a bearing either way. It’s a different game. ‘It’s a final we want to win, we won’t be thinking
about PSG when we go in to this one.’ Last season’s 7-0 humiliation in Barcelona remains Celtic’s heaviest ever European defeat. And Brendan Rodgers claimed his team’s performance was at least better against PSG — with Moussa Dembele opening the scoring against his former club after 57 seconds — than it was in the Nou Camp. Yet the loss of seven goals for a second successive year raised more scrutiny of the tactics and defensive frailties of Rodgers’ side at the elite level of the European game. His own role having been heavily scrutinised on social media, keeper Gordon claimed there was nothing more he could have done about the clinical finishing of Neymar, Cavani, Mbappe, Marco Verratti and Dani Alves. He said: ‘Every one was of tremendous quality. You could go through them all. ‘I had a few decent saves in the game. I would have liked to have had more, but the quality of the finishing was so good, I wasn’t able to do that. ‘I’ll watch it again. I’ll go through it with Stevie Woods but I don’t think we’ll have too many talking points. ‘That can happen as a goalkeeper. You can go through a game and not make too many saves, but still lose a few goals. ‘When the finishing is of that standard, you have to accept that’s the life of a goalkeeper. ‘I’ve lost seven before, it’s not the first time. I didn’t want any more than that. I probably made my best save of the night when it was at seven. It saved it going to eight, which would have been even worse.’ Celtic need to avoid defeat by more than three goals against Anderlecht in Glasgow in a fortnight to take third place in Group B and secure Europa League football after Christmas. Even if they do qualify, however, the Parkhead side are unlikely to earn one of the four seeded places awarded to the eight Champions League dropouts in the last 32. Fellow third-placed sides CSKA Moscow, Atletico Madrid, Sporting Lisbon, Spartak Moscow, Napoli and RB Leipzig are all currently on more points after five games.