For half an hour St Mirren proved a tough nut for Celtic to crack.
And, with every backwards pass, every broken-down attack, the home support battled to keep a lid on their impatience and frustration. Unfairly, in the view of Brendan Rodgers.
‘It was 0-0 for the first 20 minutes,’ said the Celtic manager, ‘and when we’d make a backward pass the crowd would be on to the team.
‘That cannot happen. One, if you know about football, and two, if you can understand it when teams come here, they’re going to make it really difficult.
‘You can’t turn up every single week and score three or four in 20 minutes. Teams are well organised, teams are well set up, you have to work the game.
‘I don’t need the cheers when it’s 3-0, and the support when it’s three, four and five-nil.
Two-goal Nicolas Kuhn celebrates his second of the afternoon with Arne Engels
Rodgers hails skipper Callum McGregor at full-time before turning his ire on supporters
Trusty was recalled to the defence in place of Scales and scored his first goal for the club
‘This team needs it. So, when we decide to go back to change the point of attack, clap the players, don’t panic.
‘Don’t start getting on to them because we’re trying to get another attack.’
At time-up, Rodgers and his team emerged from a difficult week ended with cuts, bumps and bruises, but no sign of any lasting damage.
Scotland’s champions answered questions over their powers of recovery with a reassuring win over St Mirren. On a day when Philippe Clement’s Rangers dropped more points against Hibernian, the gap at the top stretched back to 13 points.
Despite losing the skirmish, Celtic show no sign of losing the war.
With summer signings Adam Idah, Arne Engels and Auston Trusty restored to the starting line-up, an unspectacular performance never really caught fire, but came a good deal closer to expectations than the passive fare at Ibrox.
Making his first league appearance since December 7, Trusty justified his inclusion with his first Celtic goal shortly after Nicolas Kuhn shattered St Mirren’s dogged resistance with the opener after 33 minutes.
After frustrating Celtic for long periods, Trusty’s goal before half-time settled the hosts
The German — Celtic’s top scorer this term — claimed his 16th strike of the season after a horrible error by returning Saints keeper Zach Hemming gifted the champions a third goal their dominance deserved.
Since beating Rangers on Boxing Day, Stephen Robinson’s side have now lost three on the bounce to Dundee, Kilmarnock and Celtic, and are clinging to a place top six status by their fingertips.
Pointing to Hemming’s lack of recent games, the Saints manager absolved his loan signing of any blame. Back from Middlesbrough for a second loan spell after Ellery Balcombe was recalled by Brentford, Hemming had almost nothing to do until the time came to pick the ball out of the net and his day took a downward turn all round.
Celtic burst to life after 33 minutes of simmering frustration from the stands.
Luke McCowan, one of three changes to the team which lost to Rangers, sent Daizen Maeda haring down the left flank in a rare pocket of space. Despite suspicions of offside, a VAR check showed otherwise.
So often wayward with his final ball, this one was low and controlled from Maeda, picking out Kuhn. The winger took his tally to the season to 15 by getting enough on his low strike to drive the ball too close to the body of Hemming for the keeper to keep it out.
Returning loan keeper Zach Hemming collides with Fraser and Gogic, gifting Kuhn his second
Celtic’s top scorer wheels away after netting his second, much to the dismay of Hemming
When a slack defensive clearance presented Maeda with a chance to burst into space once more, and knock the ball towards goal, Hemming raced miles off his line to deal with it in unconventional fashion.
For the first time since the opening minutes, St Mirren looked ragged, Marcus Fraser motioning to his team-mates to calm down and relax.
That’s easier said than done when the champions have a wind at their backs and home advantage.
St Mirren’s composure deserted them fatally when Celtic claimed their second from some gruesome defending of a corner.
Auston Trusty’s first goal in green and white came after a difficult couple of weeks for the American international. Hauled off the pitch at half-time in the Premier Sports cup final win over Rangers, the 26-year-old then succumbed to a dose of flu.
Offered a reprieve after Liam Scales endured a day to forget at Ibrox, Trusty marked his first league appearance since December 7 by peeling off to nod an Arne Engels corner downwards into the corner of the net two minutes before half-time. Defender Richard Taylor’s role in the goal was one to forget, the No 5 switching off completely.
Trusty’s header marked a fine return to the starting line-up after a seasonal bout of flu
Rodgers was all smiles hailing red-hot Kuhn but was less positive in his post-match offerings
That lapse in concentration before half-time must have come as a huge source of frustration to Robinson. The dam, now, was well and truly burst.
A power cut across the east end of Glasgow early in the second half offered St Mirren’s best hope of averting more damage. While the floodlights switched to a back-up power source, the big screens, the club TV channel and the pitchside VAR monitor were blacked out, for a time at least.
Celtic’s third goal was a personal disaster for returning Saints signing Hemming. The on-loan keeper did brilliantly to deny Kuhn his second goal of the game when a lighting quick Celtic counter saw the excellent McCowan gather from Kasper Schmeichel and send the German in on goal.
As every goalkeeper knows, the path from hero to zero is treacherous and, from time to time, painfully short. Barely a minute later, Hemmings gifted Kuhn his 16th goal of the season when he inexplicably allowed a relatively harmless Engels backheel to slip from his grasp during a muddle with Fraser.
There might have been worse players to palm the ball to three yards out. Off the top of the head, it’s hard to think of one.
Given a chance to stake his claim for a starting place ahead of Kyogo Furuhashi, Idah cracked a volley off the crossbar, the offside flag denying the Irishman the fourth goal when he turned into the net from close range.
St Mirren had their one — possibly only — chance when substitute Jonah Ayunga threatened to capitalise on a Cameron Carter-Vickers slip, Kasper Schmeichel preserving the clean sheet.
In the final minutes of a comfortable victory, some supporters broke into a chant in praise of returning prodigal son Kieran Tierney. Another source of ire to the manager, Rodgers accused them of ‘disrespect’ towards current left-back and general fans’ whipping boy Greg Taylor.
At the end of a week when his side lost 3-0 to Rangers, it was a bold stance to take.
CELTIC (4-3-3): Schmeichel 6; Johnston 7, Carter-Vickers 6.5, Trusty 7, Taylor 6; McCowan 7 (Hatate 70), McGregor 6,5, Engels 7; Kuhn 8 (Yang 70), Idah 6 (Furuhashi 84), Maeda 7 (Palma 84). Booked: None. Manager: Brendan Rodgers.
ST MIRREN (3-5-2): Hemming 4; Fraser 5, Gogic 5, Taylor 4.5; Bwomono 5, Phillips 6, Boyd-Munce 6 (Idowu 83), O’Hara 5.5 (Smyth 63), Tanser 5 (John 84); Kiltie 4 (Oseni 63), Olusanya 5.5 (Ayunga 63). Booked: Fraser. Manager: Stephen Robinson.
Referee: Grant Irvine.
