Martindale hits out at ‘terrible’ Livi defending

LIVINGSTON boss Davie Martindale last night rued his side’s second-half defending at Parkhead — and joked that he would have made a better fist of opposing Celtic’s first goal.

Solid and organised for 45 minutes, Livi had answered every question posed by Celtic during an up-tempo first half.

However, within a minute of the restart, they had conceded as Luis Palma carved out the space to tee up Kyogo Furuhashi.

‘The first goal was terrible,’ said Martindale (below). ‘Shocking from our point of view. It’s basics. The centre-half has got him, then he (Furuhashi) just walks off and sticks the ball in the net.

‘Big Luiyi (de Lucas) has to do better. The movement wasn’t great but I think I could defend it.

‘It’s a combination of naivety and ability. Their players are at Celtic for a reason. Luiyi is at Livingston for a reason.’

Martindale didn’t name either Jamie

Brandon or substitute Michael Nottingham but they also came under fire for doubling up then allowing Palma the space to carve out the chance.

‘We worked on that all week,’ he added. ‘Palma wants to cut inside and we’ve let him do it. The defender needs to be right on him. ‘It absolutely kills it, gets the fans singing and we lose a quick second and the game is over.

‘We didn’t really lay a glove on Celtic. We were in a good position at half-time, so to throw it away is really disappointing.’

Livingston had claimed for a penalty just before the break when the ball appeared to strike Paulo Bernardo on the arm but Martindale was not convinced on the merits of the appeal.

He added: ‘I’d need to see it slowed down to see if it’s a handball. We were on the iPad but we didn’t have the chance to zoom in to see whether it’s on the tee-shirt line or below.’