On Thursday evening, Celtic secured European football after Christmas with their second victory over Hungarian side Ferencvaros.
Ange Postecoglou’s squad faced a double-header against Peter Stöger’s side, knowing that the two fixtures would be massive if they had ambitions of reaching any sort of knockout round.
The Hoops despatched Ferencvaros, 2-0 and 3-2 respectively – putting in a solid performance in both games, which were well worthy of the six points, keeping them alive in the Europa League.
Those results, though, have led to questioning for Stöger from the Hungarian media about whether he should be the man to take the champions forward.
“It’s not a pleasant situation, but we have to accept the reactions of the fans,” Stöger said when asked to address the unhappiness of the supporters by Nemzeti Sport.
“The boys could see the disillusionment in the locker room, which can be attributed to the result and the mood of the stands. An important match awaits us this weekend. We need to focus on that; I also drew the players’ attention to that.
“Unfortunately, we made several mistakes in today’s match, mostly in defence. These are hard to compensate [for] and come back into the match, but at the beginning of the second half, it worked out; it was possible to feel the boys were ready to fight.
“Unfortunately, such errors do not fit into this level.”
Of course, it is never pleasant to hear of a manager becoming closer to losing his job.
But with it coming off the back of two good performances and results from Celtic, the Hoops support will be more focused on that aspect and the improvements we have seen in the last few months.
We face two tough tests to round off the group, with a trip to Germany to face Leverkusen, before Real Betis travel to Glasgow, and Ange Postecoglou will be hoping for a strong finish to the group stage.
