Murphy’s Law

Three games into the Women’s Champions League, and Celtic are exactly where everyone probably expected them to be… more or less.

The 2-0 defeat at home to Twente was seen as Celtic’s best chance at picking up points, and that quickly slipped away.

The 4-0 defeat away to Real Madrid was quite in keeping with expectation as well.

But last week, Celtic not only scored their first group stage goal courtesy of Murphy Agnew’s neat finish after the Amy Gallacher pass, but that had Celtic leading for a few minutes against Chelsea until they inevitably turned it around to win 2-1.

But Celtic’s performance in that game at Celtic Park was decent, and as much as the stats still say Chelsea dominated the game, the 2-1 scoreline was by no means flattering. Celtic competed well, and with a bit more luck might even have got something out of the game.

Of course, Chelsea will point to the fact that they didn’t put out their strongest team, given they had the top of the table clash with Manchester City to place this weekend. That’s now out of the way, with Chelsea winning 2-0 and overtaking their rivals, still with a game in hand.

So you somewhat expect that tonight’s game at Stamford Bridge will be a different affair again, especially if they now put out their strongest team knowing they face Manchester United next in a relatively easier game than the weekend just gone. They’ll also want to keep their 100% record going in this group, without any potential threats to that from up north.

They started out with a 3-2 home win over Real Madrid…

Before winning 3-1 away to Twente.

But then again it might not be as expected. Football is played on the park, not on statistics or expectations. If it were, there would be no point playing it.

If you look across at the other groups, Celtic are by no means doing the worst. Galatasaray have a -13 goal difference after a couple of hidings from Roma and Wolfsburg as well as a defeat to Lyon, Valerenga have the same record as Celtic have losing to Juventus, Arsenal and Bayern Munich, and St Polten lost 7-0 to Barcelona in their last outing after narrower defeats to Manchester City and Hammarby. And that’s not even the biggest defeat, as Hammarby lost 9-0 to Barcelona on match day two.

It’s often said that there’s a gulf in the men’s game due to money, but such a gulf is even more evident in the women’s game. Double digits are a regular feature in the SWPL when a top team plays a not so top team, but Rangers were knocked out of Champions League qualifying at the hands of an Arsenal team who toyed with them at times. Celtic might still end up on the wrong end of a big scoreline in this campaign.

And that’s a Rangers team that just beat Celtic 3-2 on Sunday remember. Celtic are now fifth in the table, level on points with Hibernian but behind them narrowly on goal difference, a point behind third place Hearts, four points behind second place Rangers and five points behind leaders Glasgow City. Celtic face a home game against Montrose this coming Sunday.

It’s not quite Murphy’s Law of anything that can go wrong, will go wrong at Celtic right now, but Elena Sadiku’s girls don’t quite seem to be clicking on an all too frequent occasion right now. Is Europe too much of a distraction for them? I doubt anyone at Celtic would want to admit that. And who knows, maybe a decent result in Europe can be a spring board to better performances at home?

And besides, I’m sure Murphy’s Law could be redefined if we have any more great moments for Celtic like Agnew’s goal last week.

Yeah, I know that’s a stretch, but it was either that or I call this blog “Chelsea Bun” as I already used the good Chelsea title last week!

Good luck to Celtic tonight!