Not like in my day

Former Celt Pierre van Hooijdonk feels sorry for Neil Lennon over the task he faced to assemble a team for their,  what turned out to be, unsuccessful Champions League qualifier - but feels creativity must be added to the squad. The Dutchman was at Celtic Park to watch as Lennon's side dropped into the Europa League play-offs after a 4-2 aggregate defeat by Sporting Braga. And he was unimpressed by their attacking display as Celtic struggled to break Braga down in the first half before fighting back for a 2-1 win. van Hooijdonk said: "I was a bit disappointed with what I saw last night because having zero shots on target is very unusual. If you miss chances, that's something you can work on, that will come. That's just the luck that you need. But if you don't create any chances, it's hard to miss them. I felt sorry for (Georgios) Samaras because he really worked very hard. To play up front and just get long balls launched to you, isn't easy. If this is the team that's available, they still need some creativity because for me that is lacking at the moment."

Celtic have relied on Aiden McGeady in that department in recent years but the winger was in Russia holding talks with Spartak Moscow while his team-mates were winning the game but losing the tie at Parkhead. Lennon has expressed frustration with how long the prospective move is taking to progress and van Hooijdonk feels the new Celtic manager had an uphill battle trying to prepare for such an important tie. The former Nottingham Forest and Feyenoord striker said: "Football has changed, with these qualification matches the season starts earlier than when I was playing. And also because of the financial situation, clubs are signing players quite late. Normally after the season was finished, clubs already had players lined up, it was just a matter of sorting out the deal. I'm sure Neil was not putting his 11 out last night who he had on his mind before the season started. I'm sure McGeady would have been it, so that's already a change. He was maybe after some other players and can't get deals sorted. But he is playing crucial games. Then getting five or six new faces in and getting them adapted to the club, their colleagues, sometimes to the language, and the way they play, is very difficult."