SPL Saturday December 10th

Celtic 3

Hibernian 2

1:0 Hartson 40
1:1 Beuzelin 47
1:2 Fletcher 53
2:2 Maloney 57
3:2 Hartson 65

Att: 59,895

MIB: Dougie McDonald

Celtic: Boruc Telfer Balde McManus Wallace Petrov Lennon Nakamura McGeady Maloney Hartson.
subs
Pearson for Nakamura 74

Having dumped the Orcs on their natty blue pants a mere fortnight ago we had plenty of warning about how good this Hibs team could be (could being the operative word as they managed the near impossible task of losing to Dundee United the previous week) and of course we had our own 3:1 beating at the end of last season to chew on.

Well, as we've said before, Hibs are a decent football team. They play the ball on the ground and this was probably the most entertaining league game we've had for quite some time. But Celtic were more than a match for them.

All our qualities (good and bad) were on display; quick passing, good movement, good finishing coupled with an incredibly dozy period right after half time and a suicidal pass from Wallace in the last minute. McGeady was restored to the left and gave an early indication that he was happy to be back there, skipping away from his marker with a little roulette in true Zidane style, but more importantly, Nakamura and Maloney were back to ping the ball around and bring some much needed direction to our forward play (whisper it but it didn't hurt that Sutton was out - I'm a huge admirer, but these days it is certainly Sutton or Hartson, never both).

The first half saw plenty of slick passing, from both teams which we can't often say, but no real edge. Yet for all the elaborate passing the opener was almost comically simple; a foul on McGeady, a free kick into the box, a header from Hartson. John's yer uncle. 1:0 at half time, but that lead lasted all of two minutes into the second half.

Normally Celtic come out at the start of the second half raring to go having had a wee chat from WGS. This time the players appeared to have had a session with Paul McKenna, the jist of which being, 'You will wake up when Hibs are 2-1 in front'. Sleeping doesn't do it justice.

The second Hibs goal was a corker, but why were we letting them run the game?

It took Aiden McGeady something like 15 minutes to get his first touch of the second half. But then we started again. First we had fouls on Petrov (6 yards from the box), Nakamura (4 yards from the box) and Maloney (inside the D at the edge of the box). The referee had played on, giving Celtic the advantage because the ball kept falling to a Celtic player. Naturally then he placed the kick from the spot where Petrov had been downed rather than Maloney. Not that it mattered. Maloney hit a free kick that managed to clear a man jumping in the wall and still hit the net no more than three feet off the ground, and with curve on it. The goalie didn't even move, he was waiting for Nakamura to hit it.

The winner went clattering in off the shins of Hartson after Maloney had steered a deflected cross on to the post. Definitely a case of right place - right time. Having managed to each score two goals in the opening 25 minutes of the half it was odds on that we would see another couple of goals, but bad finishing and the crossbar prevented Celtic from disappearing from view, and only the pace of Boruc stopped Hibs from snatching a goal right at the death thanks to Wallace's misjudged pass back.

Three points and goal difference separate us from the Maroon balloons. The festive period approaches; Hearts are at Ibrox and that could give us an early Christmas gift no matter what the score is.