Scottish football pundit Marvin Bartley has branded recent criticism of Celtic winger Luis Palma as ‘extremely harsh’.
The Honduran international has been the subject of much discussion after returning to Brendan Rodgers’ starting lineup for Sunday’s 5-2 League Cup win over Falkirk.
With Celtic 2-1 down at half-time, Palma struggled to impact the game and was replaced by Yang Hyun-jun around the hour mark. Second-half sub Nicolas Kühn assisted twice in two minutes for Adam Idah, before firing in two goals of his own inside three minutes to turn the tie around.
Many fans were left frustrated by Palma’s display, with some questioning whether he has a future at the club. The winger has since responded with a defiant Instagram post about resilience.
But pundit and former Queen of the South manager Marvin Bartley believes it is too soon to write off the 24-year-old.
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“I think to say someone is done is extremely harsh,” he said (Clyde 1 Superscoreboard via RecordSport).
“It is not very easy to come in and try to impact a game.
“One thing I would say, I think when you play for Celtic Football Club and you play Falkirk – regardless of how well they are doing – they are a Championship team. So when you do come into that team, you have to be better than Falkirk.
“I just felt that some of the players that came in struggled too much. You are in a situation now that you would be nervous putting three of four of them in, because their standards have to be higher outside of a few.
“But, no, you can’t say somebody is done off the back of that.”
