Celtic's performance yesterday was typical of what we've come to expect from the side in SPL away games over the last two or three years, and it would probably have been described by previous boss Gordon Strachan, in the style of The Emperor's New Clothes, as a terrific performance by the team. Gordon's loyalty to his players was probably his motivation for the post-match interviews in which his comments would contradict the evidence of our own eyes. Tony Mowbray, though, doesn't seem too concerned about bruising some of the precious egos paid a King's ransom to perform in the hoops.
Three points were the requirement against St Mirren yesterday and three points were duly bagged in the 2-0 win but the manner of the victory left the manager totally underwhelmed. "I was disappointed with our performance because it was way below what I expect." said Mowbray. "The positives are we kept a clean sheet and scored two good goals. The negatives? Well, everything else. We should have passed the ball better, shown better decision-making and been more clinical."
At the end of the day Celtic had further increased their lead at the top of the SPL after Rangers dropped another two points against Aberdeen at Ibrox in their third successive 0-0 draw. The Bhoys next game is the Europa League tie against Cheating Vienna at Celtic Park on Thursday before they cross the Clyde for next Sunday's Glasgow derby and although the manager would happily accept similar results against these two sides he made it clear that he is not satisfied with the standard of play produced by players who could and should do better.
"I get frustrated because they are a good group of players." he said. "I can't accept what I saw here. We must work hard to become better and will try to be ready for Rapid on Thursday."