Former Celtic defender Mark Wilson believes the club need to strengthen their midfield after the 7-1 defeat to Borussia Dortmund exposed glaring weaknesses.
Speaking on Clyde 1 Superscoreboard, Wilson pointed to the holding midfield role as a priority, arguing that captain Callum McGregor struggled to handle the pressure on his own, with little support from teammates Arne Engels and Paulo Bernardo.
McGregor, who has often played in the deep-lying role in Europe, was left isolated as Dortmund ran riot, exploiting the space in Celtic’s midfield. Wilson highlighted the need for a more physical presence in the heart of the team, someone who can break up attacks and provide defensive solidity in high-pressure European fixtures.
“I think I’ve said for a number of years now, Celtic have been missing that real physical presence, maybe in these European nights in there,” Wilson explained. “Callum McGregor is brilliant on the ball and he’ll start moves. But is he that player that will break up attacks? Maybe not.”
Wilson didn’t shy away from criticising McGregor’s performance, acknowledging that the skipper had a poor game by his high standards, but he also suggested that the lack of support from Bernardo and Engels left McGregor overwhelmed. “I don’t think he was helped by Bernardo and Engels. I thought they were too easy to play through. As good as Engels has been, I thought he just got overrun,” Wilson added.
A defensively-minded holding midfielder could be key to taking a step forward on nights like Tuesday.
In Scotland, Celtic can get away without a holding mideilder. On paper, the captain does play there, but when you look at the positions he takes up during the matches, he’s actually quite advanced.
Rodgers done this last season with Calmac sitting deeper, and in return we got many very poor performances in return?
Completely different and far more exciting for ourselves to be playing this season, with Calmac far more advanced, and our transitional play has been outstanding, with the tactical tweak introduced?
Yet we saw in dortmund, that a good team who can play through our aggressive high press, will leave ourselves horribly exposed at the back, all the same?
Rodgers is getting the best from Calmac with the adjustment made, in the majority of the games Calmac will operate within imo?
So would be surprised for Rodgers to change now, with getting the best out of our captain, but could call upon a few tweaks to be introduced, into how we intend to set up away from home within the CL?