Max Stryjek insists he knew he was going to save Giorgos Giakoumakis’ last-gasp spot-kick to earn Livingston a point at
Parkhead on Saturday – he just can’t explain why he knew.
The Livi No.1 was superbly protected throughout the Parkhead showdown by the men in front of him and he repaid them by diving low to his right to hold the Greek striker’s feeble penalty, awarded after Ayo Obileye had almost undone all their good work by being red-carded for a petulant slap at Kyogo Furuhashi.
There’s little doubt the Japanese striker over-reacted by falling theatrically to the deck but ref Bobby Madden still made the right call and it looked like giving Celtic the win that would have taken them top of the table on Saturday night.
But Livingston ’s Polish keeper had other ideas and afterwards admitted he believed he was going to come out on top in the battle of wits with the Greek penalty taker.
He said: “I didn’t know what happened because it seemed to happen behind me.
“I’d caught the ball and I heard him blow the whistle and thought he’d given a foul for me catching someone as I caught the ball.
“I didn’t know that Ayo had hit him in the head but when I saw the red card, someone said that’s what had happened.
“It all happened very quickly and then I was having to face the penalty.
“I felt confident. I just felt something inside myself and I knew I was going to save it. I don’t know why. We analysed all their penalty takers but it is really hard to get it right because he can just go and put it in the other side and it is usually a goal.
“I just had a feeling he would put it to my right hand side and I saved it.
“The defence was brilliant.
“I think Celtic only had one shot on target apart from the penalty, so we did well in general and defended our box really well.
“We did ever so well to get a point and I think we deserved it.”
The explosive end to the match saw the Celtic support troop out of Parkhead in silence, just as they’d started the match, deliberately, by refusing to sing or chant for the first half hour in protest at the board’s apparent desire to appoint former Police Scotland Assistant Chief Constable Bernard Higgins as head of the club’s security operation.
It all added up to a strange afternoon in Glasgow’s East End and Stryjek admitted he struggled to get his round it initially.
The 25-year-old smiled: “I have
been here with a friend to watch them against Bayer Leverkusen this season and the atmosphere was unbelievable.
It was so loud and I was thinking: ‘I would love to play here.’
“And then when I got here I was thinking it was going to be really hard with 60,000 supporters shouting and singing.
“But as the game started and for the first 30 minutes I realised there was no singing and it was very quiet.
“I didn’t know why but then I heard later there was a protest.
“It was a bit weird but then it all started getting very loud after 30 minutes and it was great. I really enjoyed it.
“We play football for days like these. How can you not enjoy playing in a beautiful stadium like this with 60,000 people watching you play.
“What can be better for a footballer?”
While Stryjek and his mates enjoyed their day out, there was nothing but frustration for Celtic, who had almost complete domination but failed to carve out many decent chances.
They slung more than 30 crosses into the Livingston box and almost all of them were superbly dealt with by Tom Parkes and Jack Fitzwater, whose brilliant goal-line headed clearance denied Anthony Ralston in the first half.
That was as close as Celtic came until that frentic six minutes of injury time when Giakoumakis missed the penalty and then scorned a gilt-edged chance from six yards with almost the last mis-kick of the game.
Had that gone in, it would have been tough on the West Lothian outfit, who worked their backsides off to deny Celtic space.
They were helped by Ange
Postecoglou’s decision to keep Kyogo on the bench for the first 56 minutes and if the attacker was being kept fresh for this midweek’s European exploits then perhaps the manager got his priorities wrong because this was a real chance for Celtic to heap pressure on Rangers by going ahead of them and they blew it.
The decision, made pre-match apparently, to hand the spot-kick duties to Giakoumakis when Josip Juranovic had expertly tucked away his last two, was also on the manager.
Livi, on one of their rare forays into the Celtic box, had a decent shout for a penalty themselves when Joe Hart came charging off his line to punch clear and clatter Obileye in the process.
The Livingston defender needed lengthy treatment and perhaps his brain was stil scrambled when he made the crazy decision to respond to Furuhashi’s innocuous push on him by slapping him on the back of the head.
By doing so, the former Queen of the South man, could have undone all the hard work of his team-mates, who had stifled the life out of Celtic’s creative players.
In fact, Ralston at right-back looked Celtic’s most likely source of success with his ability to get down the right and deliver a string of crosses that ought to have been attacked with more determination than those in the hoops could muster.
In the end, they didn’t deserve any more than they got.
And Livingston deserved exactly what they got.
