Celtic defeat "harder to take than a 4-0 hammering"

Nov 20 2008 by Andrew McGilvray, Hamilton Advertiser

ACCIES defender Mark McLaughlin this week said Sunday’s 2-1 defeat by Celtic was harder to take than a 4-0 hammering.

Hamilton put in their best performance of the season and took the lead through a brilliant Richard Offiong goal, only to concede a controversial penalty and eventually lose to the Scottish champions through former Accies hero Paul Hartley’s late winner.

Gutted McLaughlin said: “All the boys gave their all, every one of us worked really hard, and to go that close and not even get a point is disappointing.

“We had the champions of Scotland coming and people probably didn’t give us a hope in hell, but I thought in the first half we played really well.

“Going down to 10 men was disappointing, especially when the referee gave a penalty because the foul was outside the box, but we just need to take it on the chin and pull ourselves up.

“If we play like that in the next few weeks hopefully we’ll start picking up results and things will start going in our favour.”

This match hinged on the inept decision by linesman Chris Young to award a penalty to Celtic for a foul that was clearly outside the box.

Referee Steve Conroy, who was about to correctly award a free-kick, pointed to the spot on advice from his assistant and red-carded Martin Canning for a foul on Cillian Sheridan, who had raced away from the Accies defence.

The dismissal was correct as Canning denied a clear goalscoring chance, but the penalty decision was ludicrous and was hard luck on a Hamilton side that was as on-top of Celtic as it’s generally possible to be.

Accies started the game brilliantly and after Sheridan had a low shot well held by Tomas Cerny, they nearly took an eighth-minute lead.

Captain Alex Neil and midfielder James McArthur linked up down the right, the ball broke to Richard Offiong, and he launched a curling effort inches over the bar.

Two minutes later Trent McClenahan’s dangerous driven cross from the right was hacked clear by rattled Celtic captain Stephen McManus.

But Hamilton scored a sublime opener in 15 minutes. McClenahan raced down the right and, looking up, timed his cross to perfection for Offiong to bullet a diving header past helpless Mark Brown from close range.

Accies could have doubled their lead in 32 minutes when Easton’s corner from the left was met by Offiong but his close-range header was superbly tipped over by Brown.

Andreas Hinkel went close with a ferocious drive that Cerny did well to turn round the right post in 36 minutes.

But Celtic levelled in 38 minutes when Sheridan darted through on the right, Canning clipped his heels and the penalty was awarded.

Shunsuke Nakamura stepped up and buried the spot-kick into the bottom right corner, although Cerny wasn’t far away.

The second half couldn’t live up to the pace and excitement of the first, and there were few early chances, although McManus sent a header narrowly wide from a Nakamura corner after 51 minutes.

Celtic were fortunate to escape a decent penalty shout two minutes later when McManus appeared to foul McCarthy in the box.

The league leaders cleared a second header off the line in 79 minutes when Chris Swailes powerfully met a McClenahan free-kick.

Cerny kept Hamilton in the game with five minutes left when he produced a simply breathtaking save to parry sub Georgios Samaras’ close-range diving header.

But with three minutes remaining Paul Hartley played a neat one-two with Scott Brown on the edge of the box before meeting the return with a sizzling half-volley that flew past helpless Cerny to deny his old club, and it was game over.

McLaughlin reckons Accies can take heart from their performance going into Saturday’s clash at Dundee United.

He said: “It’s a hard one to pick ourselves up from, but if we approach the Dundee United game in the same way hopefully we can get something from it. It’s another extremely hard game but to be honest in the Premier League there are no easy games.”

HAMILTON: Cerny, Canning, Easton, McCarthy, Swailes (Thomas, 90), McLaughlin, Offiong (Graham, 83), McArthur, McClenahan, Neil (Elebert, 76), Mensing. Subs (not used): Murdoch, Gibson, Stevenson, Lyle.

Sent off: Canning.

Booked: McArthur.

CELTIC: M. Brown, Hinkel, Wilson (Robson, 45), Caldwell, McManus, Brown, Nakamura (Samaras, 63), Maloney, Donati (Caddis, 71), Hartley, Sheridan. Subs (not used): Fox, Loovens, Mizuno, McGowan.

Referee: Steve Conroy.

Attendance: 5550.

Advertiser Man of the Match: Richard Offiong – the striker was outstanding and full of running. Hopefully this performance is a sign of things to come.