Rangers manager Giovanni Van Bronckhorst has claimed that his side ‘took over’ after 25 minutes in Celtic’s dominant 3-0 victory over our Glasgow rivals on Wednesday night.
Ange Postecoglou’s side took an early advantage in the game when midfielder Reo Hatate struck within the opening five minutes to put the Hoops 1-0 up after a rapid start to proceedings.
Celtic continued their rapid start, which could have seen them go into the break five or six goals up. However, it was only to be 3-0 at the break thanks to two late first-half strikes by Hatate and Liel Abada, ending a dominant 45 minutes with a very healthy lead.
As quoted by the Daily Record, speaking about the game to the press yesterday afternoon, Van Bronckhorst claimed that his side ‘took over’ after the first 20 minutes of the game, despite two of Celtic’s three goals coming past the 40-minute mark.
He said: “I believe in the system, but we need to make sure we keep doing the things we always did. Those are the basic things.
“We had a really bad start. We weren’t ready for the game.
“I’m sure if we have those things back or do much better than we did the last couple of games, we will be fine.
“We knew Celtic were going to push hard for the early goal. The first 20-25 minutes, there was a storm. Then we took over.
“It’s for us now to bounce back and make sure on Sunday we have that same determination we had a couple of months ago.”
These claims from the opposition boss will likely baffle the vast majority of Celtic supporters, given how good the performance was from Ange Postecoglou’s side in the opening 45 minutes.
Goalkeeper Joe Hart had effectively nothing to do in the first half, apart from coming to meet one overhit pass from Joe Aribo.
As pointed out on social media, this statement is also contradicted by the fact two of Celtic’s goals came late in the half, and players such as Jota and Giorgos Giakoumakis also had some great chances to extend the lead.
Who knows, that sort of game Van Bronckhorst must have been watching on Wednesday night, but his assessment on this part is just simply wrong.
