This morning, I published a piece suggesting that, since Ross County had made it clear they intended to use some roughhouse tactics, we’d need to respond in kind. As it turns out, that’s exactly what we’ve done. Kyogo has been dropped, and as I predicted, Adam Idah has been brought in to replace him.
After a disappointing midweek game, this is Rodgers once again showing he knows his stuff.
When the situation calls for it, he can pick the right tools for the job.
Idah is definitely the better bet for this match—he has the physical presence to rough up their defence a bit in the face of their attempts at intimidation.
Since that’s clearly Ross County’s game plan, it’s only sensible that we’ve matched them with a bit of muscle ourselves.
It’s a good call from the manager, and the rest of the team more or less picks itself.
Hatate returns in place of Bernardo, and at right-back, Johnston joins the defence alongside Scales and Trusty, which is no surprise. With Kuhn and Maeda out wide, it’s a typical strong lineup. Rodgers is clearly expecting the players who struggled in Dortmund to bounce back swiftly.
It’s a solid side, and we’ve got plenty of talent on the bench, including Kyogo himself.
In a tight game, Kyogo’s quick thinking and sharp feet could easily unsettle tired defenders and get us back on track if needed.
That said, I don’t think it will come to that today.
I expect we’ll shake off the midweek disappointment and cruise to a comfortable win.
Nothing less will do. This game needs to lift our spirits and morale, and I’m confident it will.
A big victory will not completely set aside the ghosts of the midweek disaster in Dortmund, but they will make it more bearable until the international fortnight has restored our keenness to watch our team again.
As always, I’ll catch you all on the other side of it.
Yep – That’s the Answer for sure…
Meet – Brick for Brick – Boot for Boot – Bottle for Bottle…
Even though they are ‘nice Highlanders’ – That’s the openly stated ‘welcome’ For Celtic…
An eye for an eye – A tooth for a tooth then and see if it’ll be The Cowards of The County or not !
Idah has been pants so far. A Championship player if ever I saw one.
I don’t think Idah provides any muscle at all. Compare this guy to Giakoumakis he’s not in the same league and for the most.part doesn’t do enough work for me. Yes he’s scored a couple of important goals but overall he’s barely getting pass marks for me. I think this was just a case of giving Idah game time in an “easy” match and he didn’t step up.
Totally agree. He was pants today and showed what he is: a Championship player and a very average one at that.
I don’t think picking Idah ahead of Kyogo today is a sign of managerial genius. Almost everyone of us would have done so. Brendan will need to show and do a lot more than that simple action to reassure the fans that he’s on top of his game. That midweek eye opening performance from the manager revealed a significant lack of understanding at CL level.
I hoped for a good resounding performance today, a show of resilience. I had to say I had some worries that might not happen. It didn’t in a overwhelmingly reassuring way but our efforts showed a grit though missing the fluidity we so been accustomed to.
Take it and move on and into the international break, which bursts my balls. Hopefully we’ll work like hell on the training ground to introduce a more defence structure to our game front to back. We should learn lessons from teams like County when up against the big bhoys they showed a togetherness and resounding effort to show what we clearly didn’t midweek.
I don’t like some of the comments coming from Brendan and some players about continuing in the same fashion. I hope that’s blag, it doesn’t show nous or a lesson learned. Enough though, today produced a good win from a hard working team against a strong defensive unit in County. For now I’ll definitely take that as we keep rolling on to the title. HH