Celtic Draw Pleases Neilson

No not the Scottish League Cup, but our last Premier League encounter.

Video – Celtic Highlights

Speaking to the Official Site following the scoreless draw at Celtic Park at the weekend, head coach Robbie Neilson was delighted with the focus of the players and the way they stuck to the game plan to come out with a very creditable point.

‘We`re pleased with a point but long term I`d like to build a team that comes here and wins three points. That`s what we want to do, build a team that can come here and compete, play better football and dominate the game. That`s the project. We`re still a little bit away from it but we`re heading in the right direction.’

With Celtic hammering the box with crosses during the game, it was certainly a good defensive workout and Neilson praised the squad for not panicking when they put us under pressure and for sticking to the plan and weathering the storm.

With that said, he admitted it took us a bit to get going in the game so he knows we rode our luck somewhat.

‘I thought we defended really well and kept to our gameplan. We allowed them to get the ball into the wide areas and allowed their centre-halves to have the ball and then dealt with everything from there. The first half was a little bit difficult. You come to a place like this and in the first ten minutes you have to make sure that you`re strong because they`ve got the fans behind them, they worked hard and they try and pop balls through you. We rode our luck a little bit in the first half but you have to do that here. We had a couple of chances in the game and could`ve nicked it but all in all, a point is a decent result for us.’

Callum Paterson was also interviewed after the game and he explained that he felt his growing maturity on the pitch helped him come through the encounter with plenty of plaudits, especially as he took an early booking and had to remain careful for the rest of the match.

‘We`ve not been on a great run of form in general so it`s good to hang on for a point. I`ve shown a bit of maturity. A couple of years ago, or even last year, I might`ve got another yellow card and get sent off, but it shows a bit of maturity to not get sent off and just standing up and defending like I know I can do. I enjoy it to an extent. It`s always good to play up against a good player and come out equal. He did well in the first half and I kind of figured him out towards the end of the second half so I knew how to deal with him. It was a great game and we did well to hang on for a point.’

As for the season overall and our progress so far with some highs and some lows, Paterson went on to say that sometimes you have to keep the perspective because we are only newly back in the division and we have youngsters adjusting to life at the top.

‘We`ve just come up from the Championship. We didn`t do unbelievably well in the Premiership last year, we won the Championship so it`s a bit of an overstatement to say we`re going to win the league and finish top whatever, but we`re doing well and we`re looking forward to taking last year`s form into the this year. We`re doing well, hopefully we can carry it on.’