ANGE Postecolgou today predicted that Celtic are capable of reaching “another level” this season after the Parkhead side restored their nine point lead over Rangers at the top of the cinch Premiership table.
Callum McGregor and his team mates romped to a comfortable 4-1 win over St Johnstone at McDiarmid Park this afternoon thanks to an early Andrew Considine own goal and Kyogo Furuhashi, Aaron Mooy and David Turnbull strikes.
Postecoglou was pleased with how the defending Scottish champions performed on a poor pitch in Perth – but he believes the intense competition for places that now exists in his squad coupled with not having a midweek game until March 8 will help the top flight leaders improve even further.
“It is very easy to come here today and think it is going to be a bit of a grind,” he said. “You just want to get the three points and get up the road.
“But I said to the lads before the game, don’t waste any game of football. There is a goal to be found out there all the time if you are prepared to stick to your principles. It’s pleasing the players look for that.
“They’re not just going out there and saying: ‘Lets get the three points and get on with it’. They wanted to put on a strong performance and they did."
Postecoglou added: “There has to be more to come. Some really good players didn’t get on the pitch today and some really good players didn’t get in the squad.
“For about four or five weeks now we have a game a week so that gives us the chance to work really hard at training and get everyone up another level, another notch, and increase our performance. Both on an individual and collective basis.
“We have set our mark as always trying to finish stronger than we started and we are well on the way to that. We are definitely getting stronger every week and that’s what we want to do till the end of the year.
“It (having free midweeks) will give us the opportunity to do that. When you do have three games a week it limits the opportunities to work on our game, our game patterns and individual work with the guys.
“The guys want that. We can’t, as coaches, look to the games for improvement, we have to make sure we are giving them what they need on a daily basis and I’m sure we will use this period wisely.”
Postecoglou, whose team host their Premiership rivals St Mirren in the Scottish Cup next Saturday, was pleased at how Celtic coped with a difficult playing surface in Perth.
“We knew it was going to be tough conditions today because of the pitch,” he said. “It’s a tight pitch anyway and we know St Johnstone are always hard to break down.
“I thought we handled it really well in terms of doing the hard bits of the game, working hard and everything. The quality of our football was outstanding.
“The players have this really strong mindset that even in conditions like today they don’t veer too far away from ‘our’ kind of football. Credit to the lads I thought they were really strong today.”
Postecoglou continued: “They were great goals. And we had a couple more we should probably have put away. It was a game where there was going to be mistakes, and there were mistakes because of the conditions.
“Particularly as the game wore on. It became harder for the lads to get their foothold in the game. We had to defend a little more than we usually do today because of the nature of the game and even then I thought we did really well in the box, we were really strong.
“We conceded a goal which was disappointing but again I thought the reaction to that was exactly what you want. We went up the other end and scored a quality goal. In what could have been potentially a really difficult game we exerted our authority really well.”
New signing Oh Hyeon-gyu came off the bench in the second-half and won an injury-time free-kick which his fellow substitute Turnbull scored from and Postecolgou was pleased to see his replacements make an impact.
“That’s important,” he said. “As I said, everyone wants to play. I understand that as a manager. Guys are disappointed not starting, guys are disappointed not getting on the pitch or in the squad.
“I think it is also important you use that disappointment in the right way and contributing when you are out there. Matt O’Riley was great when he came on, and Oh and Dave contribute to the goal.
“It is important for us because particularly in this stretch now when we have a game a week there won’t be the opportunity for guys to get game time. But I know what they’ll do is work hard at training and be ready when they are called up.”
