John Hartson was not impressed by one moment from Carl Starfelt’s latest Celtic performance on Thursday night.
The Hoops recorded a comfortable 3-0 home win over Czech opponents FK Jablonec to secure victory in the two-legged Europa League third qualifying round tie.
It means manager Ange Postecoglou has now watched his team win three games on the spin. They are starting to show signs of progress after a worrying start.
Starfelt, 26, has definitely had a challenging beginning to his Hoops career.
The Swedish defender joined in the summer from Rubin Kazan on a four-year deal and has come under the spotlight for some errors at the back.
He looked fairly comfortable for the majority of last night’s game, however, there was one controversial incident. The centre-back lunged in for a sliding tackle in the box on an attacker and was perhaps a little fortunate not to give away a spot-kick.
Pundit and ex-Celtic forward Hartson ripped into the moment early on in the second half.
“That’s a shocking tackle from Starfelt. He is very lucky not to give away a penalty,” Hartson said during Premier Sports’ coverage of Celtic’s 3-0 win.
MORE CELTIC STORIES
Celtic need to stay grounded
For Celtic, they need to give a Starfelt a few more games to see if he can get over what has clearly been a nervous start to life in Scotland.
The centre-half has a relatively long-term deal. Therefore, Postecoglou should look to work on him getting back to basics and to staying concentrated for 90 minutes.
Despite a mini revival in the last few games, it must be stressed there is still plenty of work the club need to do in the window.
Ideally, the Hoops need a few more signings, including an extra option at centre-back.
In other news, ‘Oh my days’, ‘Love to see’: Some Tottenham fans love announcement about Bryan Gil