Celtic hit their level and impress.

I had been hearing managers saying all week that it was time for players to “step up a level” now pre-season was over. Got me thinking since Celtic have played Arsenal, Lyon, Blackburn and failed to step knee high up to a European challenge does this mean that the Celtic players need to step down a level now the domestic fare has begun?

Early European qualifiers do give the season a false start. The season doesn’t begun until Ross Tokely – or replace with some other curb stone – tries to kill you centre forward with his halitosis breath.

This was a game of two fresh starts. One for a team celebrating success and another for a team looking back at inglorious failure. Celtic seem to have first dibs on the abundance of under performing first team players and some of them haven’t yet been hit with the door on the way out. This was a test.

Celtic, looked like the best  lime ice pole that has ever been invented. It’s a kit that ticks the nostalgia box and also the one that means that kids will be seen in the dark. I like it and I also liked the look of some of those wearing it.

Joe Ledley proved he could hit the ball very straight and very hard. He looks the brains in partnership between him and Brown. Cha Du Ri is an interesting sort. The pragmatic in me says that he is not as good as Hinkel but the maverick in me is shouting “He’s fecking great, he moves in stealth like a kung fu villain” with no regard to his defensive abilities or why I think he could be the Korean Anton Rogan.

It’s become ‘trendy’ to slate Paddy McCourts fitness. True, sometimes he looks like he is being sponsored by Benson and Hedges but when he plays a 40 yard crossfield pass that takes out all of the Information Computer Technology team and all of the Celtic team apart from Fortune then I will put up with his nicotine fingers.

He doesn’t track back I hear you cry. Well, around 25 mins in I saw him making a tackle on the half way line. I have saved it on my Sky Plus to show the grandkids. His goal was trademark.

I have yet to see video evidence of a creative player being involved in the game for 90 minutes. To batter Paddy with this stick is unfair. I think they are scared.

It was Shaun Maloney’s day. A player who can hide under a postage stamp and has done on many occasions was as busy as a hamster being poked with a biro. He grew in confidence after a glaring first half miss when he was all to gallus to early.

We started last season like a collie who had a firework up it’s arse. This season we have started as if we have more to give. The starting the formation was dressed as a 4-2-3-1, which seems to be this seasons new black cords. If Tony Mowbray had dressed the same team it would have been called a pastel blouse 4-2-4, which wouldn’t have survived a light load wash.

The difference? We worked when we didn’t have the ball and dug in when we had a bad spell plus don’t let the back four have the ball very often. The missed chances are a hangover caused by having under achieving first team players still threatening our happiness.

Time to sort that out.