CELTS BOSS WANTS TO KEEP HIGH STANDARD

Ange Postecoglou offered no excuses as he admitted Celtic “were well off it” as they started their Australia trip with a 2-1 defeat to Sydney FC yesterday.

The Scottish champions took the lead in the opening game of the Sydney Cup when Alexandro Bernabei’s 23rd-minute shot took a big deflection off Kyogo Furuhashi and ended up in the net.

But the hosts hit back two minutes later and then got themselves in front early in the second half.

Manager Postecoglou was disappointed with the way his team played.

“It’s fair to say we were nowhere near the level we need to be,” he said.

“It was an entertaining game with plenty goalmouth action for both teams, but we were well off it.”

Celtic were without their World Cup contingent of Aaron Mooy, Cameron Carter-vickers, Daizen Maeda and Josip Juranovic, as well as injured captain Callum Mcgregor, but they were still able to send out a team made up predominantly of established names.

Youngsters Scott Robertson, Rocco Vata and Bosun Lawal were introduced, but Postecoglou insisted there was no excuse for the team performance.

“Irrespective of who has been playing and who hasn’t been playing, we were nowhere near the level we needed to be,” he said.

“In football, if you’re not (near the level), you don’t get the outcomes you need.”

Postecoglou – returning to his homeland – was impressed with the backing Celtic got from their supporters inside Sydney’s Allianz Stadium and he is hoping he can repay them with a victory when the Hoops conclude their tour with a match against Everton on Sunday.

“The support was brilliant, as always,” he said.

“Unfortunately we couldn’t reward them tonight but hopefully we do on Sunday. We’ll recover from this and be ready for Sunday. We need to try and make sure we’ve got the mindset we need to be successful.”