Summary
Well it wasn’t pretty, but Celtic got there: Boyata’s headed goal in the first leg proving decisive. It was a poor pitch, and as a result, both teams were poor going forward, Celtic’s Johansen having the pick of the chances. Defensively is where Celtic stood out: all four were excellent: Lustig, Boyata, Van Dijk and Izaguirre.
Celtic will know their play-off opponents on Friday, when the draw is made in Nyon at Uefa’s headquarters. Manchester United, Sporting Lisbon and Lazio all enter the draw at this stage, so Champions League football is far from confirmed for Celtic, just remember what happened in last year’s play-off against Maribor.
Thanks for reading, and for your emails and tweets. See you next time!
#UCL | Congrats to @celticfc on their progression to the @ChampionsLeague play-off round! The draw is on Friday. pic.twitter.com/b0lmEXTnX2
— Scottish FA (@ScottishFA) August 5, 2015
Updated
Full-time: Qarabag 0-0 Celtic (0-1 on agg)
That’s it, Celtic are through to the Champions League play-off!
90+4 min: Qarabag are going long, but Celtic are holding firm. Lustig and Van Dijk both head crosses away. One minute!
90+2 min: Bitton robs Garayev in the middle of the pitch but his through ball to Griffiths is too strong and Sehic comes out to clear. Keep the ball!
Updated
90 min: Five minutes added on! We had a water break though, so that is probably justified.
88 min: Two minutes left. The quality in this second half has been poor all round, but Celtic won’t care if they can get over the line. They’ve got 10 men behind the ball but are looking dangerous on the counter-attack, as Qarabag push forward for the equaliser. Izaguirre is booked for kicking the ball away after a free-kick.
Updated
86 min: Chance for Forrest! He zooms down the right, leaving a ragged Almeida in his wake, gets a lucky bounce and all of a sudden, he’s clean through on goal! But rather than shoot, he tries to square the ball to Griffiths and the ball is intercepted! Why didn’t he shoot?!
84 min: The last of the subs: Forrest on for Armstrong for Celtic, and Tagiyev is on for Qarabag.
83 min: Chance for Johansen … what a miss! Oh he really should have scored that precious away goal for Celtic, latching onto a nicely weighted pass from Armstrong, but blasts the ball a yard wide from 15 yards out! Deila has hit head in his hands.
81 min: Qarabag have a couple of hopeful shouts for a penalty. There is nothing in the first, but Boyata is clumsy with the second, coming through the back of Reynaldo. The referee says no, but we’ve seen them given. Nervous times.
78 min: Commons on, Mackay-Stevens off. Is guile really what Celtic need at the moment?
75 min: Another water break. More time slipping away.
73 min: Scott Brown is really coming into his own here: when he doesn’t have the ball, he is doggedly tackling Almeida and Garayev off the park. When he does have it, he is sensible, retaining possession. Brown makes another interception to quell another Qarabag attack. Top stuff.
72 min: Mammadov, who is a dangerous dribbler, comes on as Qarabag make their second change.
70 min: Nothing is happening, which is just how Celtic like it.
67 min: Celtic change: Griffiths is on for Ciftci, who looks absolutely knackered.
65 min: Great block by Boyata! The Belgian showed no fear to close down a stinging El Jadeyaoui shot, after the winger had collected a cross from Ismayilov. Boyata never quite looked assured at City but he’s having a decent game tonight.
64 min: Qarabag make their first change: Ismayilov comes on for Poepon.
63 min: Van Dijk meanders out of defence again, but is robbed and caught out of position. Johansen promptly cuts Poepon down to stop the counter-attack. He’s rightly booked.
61 min: The drop in pace only serves to suit Celtic. They string together a few passes and suddenly Mackay-Steven finds himself in a pocket of space mid-way inside the Qarabag half. He drops the shoulder to get clear of Garayev and feeds Armstrong on the left side of the box, who curls his shot just over the bar. That was close – Celtic’s best effort so far.
58 min: There are some tired legs out there. The heat has taken its toll. The tempo is evaporating from this game.
Updated
55 min: El Jadeyaoui shoots from range, easily caught by Gordon.
53 min: Another Qarabag corner, more trouble for Celtic. This time Almeida takes it short, and Qarabag work it square, before attempting a slide rule pass back to Almeida who had crept in behind undetected. The pass takes a slight deflection, and Gordon scampers off his line to push the ball out of harm’s way.
51 min: Ciftci is cutting a dejected figure: both him and Johansen have both been on the receiving end of a couple more poor refereeing decisions. The man in black (actually luminous green tonight) Strombergsson hasn’t had the best of nights so far.
49 min: Forrest, Griffiths and Commons both on the bench for Celtic, remember. Would you like to see them on? Griffiths, providing he’s fit, won’t be able to hold the ball up in the same way that Ciftci can, but he does have a better chance of getting in behind Qatarbag. Boy’s got wheels.
Celtic fans, here’s another question? Is Commons’s absence purely down to injury or is it tactical? He was excellent last season, scoring 16 goals from midfield, I know that he fractured his toe last month, but is there another factor here? Perhaps he doesn’t do the defensive work as well as Armstrong or Johansen?
Updated
47 min: Corner to Qarabag: Boyata half-clears to the edge, and Guseynov blasts a good 20 metres over the bar.
Peeep peeeep! And we’re off again. No subs made by either team.
Half-time entertainment:
Half-time: Qarabag 0-0 Celtic
It’s tense. Not many clear-cut chances: if there is a goal, you feel it will come from a mistake.
45+1 min: Johansen is penalised for what seems like a perfectly legal challenge on Guseynov. Johansen is incensed and the referee has a word in his ear. The Norweigan escapes a yellow.
45 min: Increasingly desperate defending from Celtic, who are just looking to get to half-time, hacking the ball out of play. Two minutes added on here.
44 min: Bitton nearly scores from 50 yards out, attempting to lob Sehic, who initially looked like he would be caught out. However, the Bosnian gathers the ball, diving to his left.
41 min: … but it’s punched clear by the keeper. El Jadeyaoui breaks away but Bitton is on hand to legally shoulder-barge him off the ball.
Updated
40 min: Free-kick to Celtic, and they throw the big guns up from the back. It’s pumped long and Sehic fumbles the ball, but is lucky as the ball bounces out for a corner. Remember this is how Celtic scored in the first leg …
38 min: More good defending from Van Dijk, easing Poepon off the ball, as he tries to connect with a Agolli cross. He’s been the stand-out player of the half so far.
36 min: And Quintana so nearly opens the scoring! The former Valencia man wriggles free of Brown and latches onto a clever reverse pass by Reynaldo, but Boyata makes a fine sliding tackle inside Celtic’s area. The crowd go wild, but no penalty there. Good tackle.
34 min: Sutton does also keep referring to Qarabag’s ‘technicians’, a phrase I despise. I think he’s trying to say that Quintana, the Azerbaijani’s attacking midfielder, is good at football, which he is.
32 min: We’re having a drinks break. Isn’t this sort of stuff reserved for pre-season games? “Modern players have gone soft,” remarks tonight’s co-commentator Chris Sutton.
30 min: “Gotta be the Allianz Arena,” emails Michael Hoare, in response to the best looking stadia question I asked earlier. “Brilliant concept for a football stadium – especially a shared one.”
28 min: Agolli cuts inside off the left, and feeds Almeida, who is in acres of space outside the Celtic box. He takes a touch and lets fly, but Gordon shoots to his right, and parries the ball away from danger. It was a fierce shot, great one-handed save!
Updated
25 min: Just to highlight this again: it’s still 28°C in Baku despite it being just shy of 10pm there, the Scots are unsurprisingly sweaty. The pitch is perhaps less bobbly than we expected but it runs extremely quick, let’s just say that if this was a cricket outfield, there would be plenty of boundaries. Proving hard to dribble, as Mackay-Steven and Johansen have found out.
Updated
22 min: Quite the battle going on between El Jadeyaoui and Izaguirre on Celtic’s left-hand side. First, the Qarabag winger gets the better of his marker, whipping in a floating cross, which Gordon flaps at. The rebound could have gone anywhere but luckily it falls back towards Izaguirre, who hacks clear.
19 min: Celtic are beginning to come into the game a little more, and are testing Qarabag from wide areas. First Amstrong whips one in from the right, Ciftci is ruled offside. Next Izaguirre tries from the left, but Gurbanov clears.
17 min: Chance for Qarabag. Yet again, it’s terrible Celtic defending at a corner: Almeida rolling a low ball to the edge of the box, where Sadygov is all alone. The Azerbaijani strikes first time at goal from 20 yards, but completely scuffs his shot! Let off.
16 min: The referee has been VERY lenient so far. Mackay-Steven is the latest to be dumped to the turf, after he had done well to scamper after a clearance by Biton. No foul. The Scot ain’t happy.
13 min: Mackay-Steven and Johansen are pressing high, hoping for a mistake at the back. Deila stated how he is going after that crucial away goal before the match, not a bad tactic.
11 min: Van Dijk, who has already made some telling interceptions at the back, strolls out of defence, past one defender, two, three! But he overcooks a touch and is robbed well inside Qarabag’s half. Can the Azerbaijanis counter-attack with the Dutchman out of defence? Nope, too slow.
10 min: Agolli whips the ball in from the left and it’s cleared behind by Boyata. The resulting corner is whipped in, and Sadygov gets a dangerous flick on at the near post but Reynaldo can only control the ball with his arm. Blatant handball, free-kick to Celtic, the Brazilian should really have been booked there. Poor defending from Celtic though.
8 min: Celtic build their first attack, and Brown pings a diagonal in the direction of Johansen, who is looking to break the offside trap, but the ball is just too strong, and it runs through to Sehic.
6 min: Celtic haven’t had a kick yet. This is looking ominous. Brown and Armstrong haven’t strung a single pass together yet.
4 min: Cifti holds the ball up well, collecting a clearance, and is promptly bundled to the ground by his marker, Guseynov. That’s good play by the striker, he’ll need to win those mini-battles to help Celtic get up the pitch.
2 min: It’s rowdy out there alright, the crowd is up for it. Izaguirre is turned by Reynaldo, Qarabag’s resident Brazilian, and the home supporters go wild before Biton gets across and boots it out for a throw.
Peeep peeeep, and we’re off!
The teams are out: Celtic in their green and white, Qarabag in their all black. Let’s go!
Quick question: what are the best looking stadiums from the outside? I’d plump for the AAMI Park in Melbourne, home of Melbourne Victory (and rugby league side Melbourne Storm).
Check out @AAMIPark tonight! What a night for it #CAM300 #purplepride pic.twitter.com/Yp7sIstaRP
— Melbourne Storm (@storm) July 17, 2015
Get in touch with your suggestions: michael.butler@theguardian.com and via Twitter @michaelbutler18.
There have been some serious question marks over the quality of the pitch. It’s dry – temperatures got up to 42°C on Tuesday – and it’s bobbly after being ruined by track and field events at the European Athletics Championships in June.
Sounds like we’re in for a tiki-taka night then. Oh well, at least the facade outside the stadium looks nice?
So …
No Leigh Griffiths in the starting XI, he obviously hasn’t shaken off the knock he sustained in Celtic’s opening Scottish Premiership game against Ross County.
No Charlie Mulgrew, he remains sidelined with a minor knee injury
Nir Bitton starts, recovering from an ankle injury.
Updated
The teams:
Qarabag: Sehic, Gurbanov, Guseynov, Sadygov, Agolli, Quintana, Garayev, Almeida de Oliveira, El Jadeyaoui, Poepon, Reynaldo.
Subs: Veliyev, Vuqar Mustafayev, Mammadov, Ismayilov, Yunuszada, Tagiyev, Diniyev.
Celtic: Gordon, Lustig, Boyata, van Dijk, Izaguirre, Brown, Biton, Mackay-Steven, Johansen, Armstrong, Ciftci.
Subs: Bailly, Ambrose, Griffiths, Commons, Rogic, Janko, Forrest.
Referee: Markus Strombergsson (Sweden)
If you want to catch up on the finer details of last week’s first leg against Qarabag, you can do so here, in Graham Ruthven’s match report:
If you can’t be bothered to click the link, here’s a quick synopsis:
- Celtic looked pretty toothless going forward after Ronny Deila opted for Nadir Ciftci over the in-form Leigh Griffiths up top
- The only threat was from set-pieces and this is how summer signing Dedryck Boyata scored the only goal with eight minutes remaining
- Deila was happy that they didn’t concede an away goal
Preamble
Admin is rarely interesting. There are those out there that get a kick out of a well-maintained spreadsheet or a meticulous holiday itinerary or having just one spelling of Jay-Z on their iTunes – “but it’s infuriating when Jay-Z, Jay Z, Jay z, jay-Z, JAY-Z, create different artist tabs” they may or may not cry – but for the most part, it is justifiably regarded as a chore, a necessary evil.
And yet, in last year’s Champions League third qualifying round second leg, admin – or rather the lack of it – was Celtic’s saviour. Having been roundly thumped 6-1 by world beaters Legia Warsaw over the two legs, the Scottish champions were offered a reprieve after the Polish club fielded an ineligible player. Legia’s 2-0 victory at Murrayfield was transformed into a 3-0 win for Celtic, which was enough to secure the jammiest of 4-4 away goals qualification to the play-off round. Legia protested – the player in question, Bartosz Bereszynski, had only ran around for a matter of minutes at the end – but the Court of Arbitration for Sport held the line: Celtic were through!
Celtic then went on to miserably lose the subsequent play-off to Maribor – a result mocked by Legia …
— Legia Warszawa (@LegiaWarszawa) August 26, 2014
Manager Ronny Deila, under two months in the hot-seat, came under all sort of pressure, but recovered as the season progressed, helping Celtic to the Europa League round-of-32, and the inevitable Scottish Premiership title.
But with domestic domination a given, it is in Europe where Celtic and Deila will be judged. They are 1-0 up against Qarabag after a nervy first-leg win at Celtic Park last week. It’s still in the balance as they travel to Azerbaijan.
So here we go again Celtic: it’s the Champions League third qualifying round second leg! Let’s hope the Scots do better than last year, or pray that Qarabag field an ineligible player.
Kick-off: 5.30pm BST
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