A traditionally tough trip to Dingwall to take on Ross County today, (Saturday) was met by a resolve and determination in the Celtic side to make the long journey home with all three points. And the travelling Celtic support also made the journey home with the added warmth of full points as a double from Kyogo followed by a retaken Arne Engels penalty and a goal from Luke McCowan delivered a 4-1 win in the lunchtime kick-off. After the 4-2 win, the manager, Brendan Rodgers told Celtic TV: “I was so pleased, I think everyone can tell the conditions, the pitch – it was a real challenge today. “But I thought the resilience of the team really came through, as when you have that consistency, it’s a facet you need to have. ‘It was always going to be difficult to play fast, flowing football but we dominated the first half, and performance-wise we should have been more than one goal up.’ “We started the second half in a good place, then we give the ball away cheaply for a throw-in over in the corner, then that spell led to them getting penalty from it. “But we dusted ourselves off, went again, made some changes to bring energy back into the game and then I thought we deserved the scoreline in the end. “And that’s a fantastic tribute to the effort of the players and everything they gave to the game.”The introduction of Luke McCowan and Johnny Kenny, the latter making his Celtic debut after returning from Shamrock Rovers on loan, added a freshness to the proceedings that County found difficult to combat. The manager said: “It’s what you want, because they sat freezing on the side, then they’ve got to come in and make an impact, and they do that. “Luke does what he does. Obviously we were missing two guys on the sides who score a lot of goals so it was important that we wanted goalscorers on to the pitch and he can score a goal, Johnny has scored goals for Shamrock. “So I thought both of them came in and added a freshness to the game for us.” The game took the gap, for 24 hours at least, to 18 points and the manager has been delighted with the consistency of his players in creating that lead at the top. He said: “It’s very pleasing, because it’s not an easy thing to do at all, but it’s something that they train for every day – the standard and performance in training, the mind-set in training is so good,. “And then we take that into the game because one of the biggest failings in becoming successful is that your mind-set is not right or you have a negative mind-set, but this group haven’t. “We message them, we train them, we work them to go out into very game to be the very best “You see in days like today when it wasn’t all going their way and they get pegged back, they still have a response there and a fight to get the win. “So we’re so, so pleased and obviously for the supporters as well, because the journey up here and to be in the freezing cold, so at least in the second half we were kicking down towards the supporters and they pull the ball into the net, and they can go away really happy.”FixturesRoss County Vs. Celtic – Sat, Jan 11th 2025, 12:30
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