BRENDAN Rodgers insisted that last night’s 7-1 humbling at the hands of Paris St Germain in the Parc des Princes was nowhere near as demoralising as the 7-0 defeat to Barcelona last September – and the setback would only make his players more determined than ever to beat Motherwell at Hampden Park on Sunday to retain the Betfred Cup.
Everything seemed so positive for the Parkhead side when Moussa Dembele steered in an opener within just 59 seconds which was the first goal Alphonse Areola had conceded during the entire Champions League campaign, but the Qatari-backed Parisians rammed home their credentials to win this competition for the first time with seven goals without reply, two each from Neymar and Edinson Cavani, and one from Kylian Mbappe, Marco Verrati and Dani Alves.
Read more: Moussa Dembele can get no satisfaction from breaching PSG defence in Celtic rout
While the Parkhead side’s hopes of playing Europa League football after Christmas, as expected, will boil down to the meeting with Anderlecht in the final matchday, another blow for Celtic ahead of Sunday’s first showpiece of the domestic season was the departure of Mikael Lustig with injury early on. Barring an outlandish 4-0 reverse against Bayern Munich, PSG will top Group B, and have now set an all-time Champions League record with 24 goals in the group stages - no fewer than half of which have come against Celtic.
“I am certainly nowhere near as disappointed as I was funnily enough against Barcelona last season,” said the Celtic manager. “We conceded seven goals over there when I first came in and I was very, very disappointed after that, but in a strange way I thought there were a lot of good moments in this game.
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"We scored, started with good intent, got the goal, and you could see the belief in how we were playing and defending," he added. "But we gave the ball away in midfield and that gives them the opportunity to get the goal. The spell after the first goal is probably the bit we are most disappointed with."
As harsh as it was, Rodgers was determined to keep learning the lessons, but said Celtic's players did have the technical level to line up in this manner against these teams. “Of course there are lessons for us," he said. "Can we keep the ball a bit better? In the second half we have it away loosely and I know we can defend better. If you look at it, four of the goals at least were either down to us either giving the ball away, or not defending the second phase of a set piece well enough.
"Sometimes with the ball we gave it away too cheaply, but there were lots of other spells where we showed our confidence," Rodgers added. "And you also have to admire the sheer quality of PSG, you can’t not admire that. I think they only had 11 shots, but seven of them went in, with big quality. I would be very surprised if they don’t at least reach the Champions League final.
Read more: PSG 7 Celtic 1: Game Set and Match as early ace serves up painful reward
"If you think of the first goal, you lose possession of the ball. In lots of the games you will get away with it, give it away against this team and they will punish you. Celtic players have a good technical level but against a superior team like PSG their technique is at a slightly higher level and when you’re chasing the ball you tire a bit in the game. What you are watching here in Paris is the world’s best.
"We will see how Mikael is over the next couple of days. But structurally it affects us, taking off a player who is a very important player for us.
“Of course with professional pride, losing seven goals, you are not so happy. People who didn’t watch the game and score, they think 7-1. But there were enough positive moments in it. Sunday, like it always was, is going to be a very important game. But I told the players afterwards that they gave absolutely everything. And we will be absolutely fine for Sunday, we are disappointed of course, but even more determined now to win on Sunday.”
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