Lennon refuses to talk up prospect of tight title race
CELTIC V ST MIRREN
and I’m not a clairvoyant,” said the Celtic manager. “We are ten games into the season, so I think it is good for everyone. It keeps the intensity levels up. I think the players are enjoying the challenge both domestically and Europe.
“But, from a manager’s point of view, I’d rather be 20 points clear in March. I’ll take what I can get. And, at the minute, I’m getting really good performances and results so it’s just step by step really. I get asked these questions all the time but you can’t predict it. We may have a drop off or we may kick on, we may get a spate of injuries, I don’t know. So it is important just to enjoy what we are doing at the minute and look forward to another important game tomorrow.”
Lennon won’t make changes to his team, despite the encounter being one of seven in little over three weeks.
“When you are playing well you just come in, do your recovery and get ready to go again and I think a lot of players like that,” he said. “It’s demanding, but sometimes you give them a rest and it knocks them off kilter. Psychologically, they switch off, so while they’re playing well and in the groove I’m not going to give them a rest.”
He concedes, though, that with Odsonne Edouard shouldering the central striker duties on his own, adding a forward in the January window might become a consideration. “We need to get [Leigh] Griffiths back in and around it to give us more depth and support,” he said.
“The sooner he gets fit, the better [he started training on Thursday]. You get anxiety [around Edouard] because he is a quality player and you don’t want to lose him at any time. If it is the case, hopefully Bayo, Griffiths and couple of others could slot in there.
“We’re getting goals from all over and that may be magnified if we were to lose Odsonne for any period of time. Mikey [Johnston] can do it, [Ryan] Christie can do it. But you don’t want to lose Odsonne for any games because he is so pivotal to the way we play. We’d just have to manage it if that eventuality comes around. It may be an area we’ll look at. But there are no set targets, as yet.”
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Craig Bryson admits Aberdeen deserved most of the criticism they received after Sunday’s humiliating 4-0 defeat but insists BBC Scotland pundit Steven Thompson took it too far by claiming “they just lay down to Celtic”.
Theformerrangersstriker made his controversial statement on Sportscene hours after the final whistle at Pittodrie but the Dons midfielder has branded that comment as completely unacceptable.
Bryson is outraged that Thompson, pictured, would question the professionalism of the Aberdeen players, even if he agrees that their performance fell well below the standards expected of them. There was no such claim made after Aberdeen’s recent 5-0 defeat against Rangers and he is furious at the former Ibrox front man’s implication that the Dons players deliberately went out of their way to let Celtic win the game.
The former Scotland international said:“what footballer is ever going to lie down? Nobody is ever going to go into a game wanting to get beat. What does it even mean? Lying down, what is that? Is that wanting to get beat?
“We worked all week on a gameplan and a way we felt would help us get something from the game. So I don’t see how someone can say we went into the game and lay down. Sometimes you don’t play well and you don’t win the tackles or headers, but it’s not for a lack of trying.
“Sometimes a team is just