Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers has explained his decision to withdraw Greg Taylor at the midway point of tonight’s match against St. Johnstone.
The Hoops eventually cruised to a dominant 6-0 victory in Perth, with the left-back coming off at half-time.
Although he was outstanding in the opening 45 and played a sublime cross into the box to set up Kyogo Furuhashi for his second of the evening, Taylor was hooked by boss Rodgers at the break.
He was duly replaced by Barcelona loanee Alex Valle, who did himself no harm with an impressive second-half performance.
The Spaniard looked an attacking threat on the left-hand side and set up Adam Idah, who finished off a spectacular team move to give the Celts a 6-0 lead.
There were question marks over the decision to replace Taylor going into the second 45, but gaffer Rodgers has since provided some clarity.
Speaking after the match, the Irishman explained that Taylor felt a slight niggle and, with Celtic 3-0 up, there was no point in taking any risks.
“We had Greg just felt a tightness in his calf in the first 15 minutes”, said the boss (The Celtic Way).
“So just precautionary, we take him off and put Alex in. And yeah, we hope that he should be fine. And obviously, it just allowed us to manage some of the other players as well.”
Away at Dortmund, Rodgers will ideally want his first-choice starting 11 available.
Taylor has been particularly key at the start of the new season, but young Valle proved himself to be a dependable option this evening.
Yes valle looked good addition to Celtic squad what you would expect from Barcelona academy the run and unselfish set up was brilliant thank var Celtic never get the benefit on close calls we do now but it’s human being still making the calls I’m sure a computer could do it we have seen close calls favouring defender it should be the attacker naeda goal chopped off another judgement call that went against Celtic don’t Robertson has previous for calls against Celtic
Valle was much better than good and had an excellent game. There should be no questions asked about this substitution. Valle was integral to the whole of a first class second half and the move involving the chip from McCowan to Valle and the back heel to Idah for Valle’s assist his assist was “chust sublime” as Para Handy would say. This demonstrated his excellent reading of the game and partnership with his team mates. The bhoy was made for this club and this team. I hope we can keep him.