As Celtic prepare for their big game against Bayer Leverkusen in the Europa League, not many are giving the Glasgow side much hope to take anything from the match.
In fact, many people are predicting that the Hoops may lose heavily if they continue to forge ahead with their attacking philosophy.
But, as Ange Postecoglou has consistently said, he will not change his style that he believes in. All his professional career as a manager, he has only known one way to play and that is attack.
In his pre match press conference [Sky Sports], Ange revealed he will NOT change his philosophy against Leverkusen as he said, “We’ll only learn from the game if we play our football. You’ll learn absolutely nothing if you go out there and shy away from it.
“We can go and be conservative, try and hold on, try and survive, but if we do that we’ll learn nothing.
“All you learn is that you’re inferior and you don’t believe you can be any better.
“The only way we’ll learn anything in this game is if we go out there and take the game to them. That may be a painful lesson for us all but ultimately it’s a better way for us to find out.”
Many pundits and journalists continually bang the drum about Celtic’s defensive frailties, even though the Hoops have the best defensive record in the Scottish league!
Ah! But that’s just Scottish football they say. European football is different. Celtic can’t defend in Europe they keep telling us.
Not so as a brilliant stat has revealed that Celtic’s attack is the best form of defence as Australian expert Sacha Pisani tweeted:
No team’s forced more high turnovers in 21-22 #UEL than Celtic (47) with 10 of those ending in a shot, most of any side. @OptaJoe
“𝑆𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑖𝑛 𝑜𝑝𝑒𝑛 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑦 & 𝑏𝑒𝑔𝑖𝑛 40𝑚 𝑜𝑟 𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑜𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑛𝑒𝑛𝑡'𝑠 𝑔𝑜𝑎𝑙” pic.twitter.com/yTCzBYlp7C
— Sacha Pisani (@Sachk0) November 25, 2021
And we are only five months into his tenure. FIVE MONTHS!
Imagine what the team would be capable of when the big Aussie gaffer gets a couple of windows under his belt.