Strachan will chop and change to keep team fit and fresh

Published on Tuesday 16 September 2008 22:50

GORDON Strachan's newfound reputation as Scotland's very own Tinkerman is likely to be enhanced tonight as he attempts to plot a successful course through Celtic's opening Champions League Group E match against Aalborg at Parkhead.

Despite a ruthless exhibition of attacking football that brought the 4-2 victory at Motherwell on Saturday, the Celtic manager seems certain to make changes in his team, reinstating some familiar faces to what is an unfamiliar situation.

For the first time in six attempts, the Scottish champions begin their campaign at home to the lowest seeds in the group, making them not only favourites – also a unique experience for an opening game – but as prohibitively priced as 2-5 with some bookmakers. With the Danish champions available at 8-1, the home fans will have high expectations.

It is reasonable to assume that a large proportion of the 60,000 expected at Celtic Park would be happy to see an unchanged side take the field, but Strachan revealed yesterday that he had prepared his entire squad for the prospect of regular tinkering during the coming months and that none among them should consider himself an automatic choice.

"I made it clear to the players recently," said Strachan, "that we have a big period coming up and that I would be thinking of regularly freshening things up. I mean, I couldn't expect people to be sitting on the bench for eight matches in a row and then suddenly throw them into a very big game.

"I had already been thinking about this match against Aalborg before the Motherwell match and I won't be deviating much from that. Most of our players have had at least a touch of Champions League football, so there isn't much to be anxious about in that respect."

In attempting to ascertain Strachan's intentions, it may be advisable to place some significance on his appraisal of tonight's opponents, especially where his prospective partnership in attack is concerned. "Anybody who thinks Aalborg will be like Copenhagen, whom we played a couple of seasons ago, will be wrong," he said. "They are nothing like as big and physical and they like to play the ball around when they can."

From this, it is tempting to infer that Scott McDonald, who made a scoring return to the team at Motherwell, could be back on the bench to allow Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink – suspended for last weekend's match – to join the in-form Georgios Samaras in a pairing that would surely present an aerial threat to the Danes. It is also possible that Shunsuke Nakamura and Aiden McGeady will be restored to the flanks. The Japanese midfielder's dead-ball expertise may be irresistible to Strachan on a night when a home side expected to be doing most of the attacking could be rewarded with a plethora of free kicks by a referee – Matteo Trefoloni of Italy – ready to impose the stricter disciplines of the European game.

Despite the ebullient form of Shaun Maloney at Fir Park, McGeady's selection would be based simply on the horses-for-courses principle. He has a good record against even the most formidable of opponents in the Champions League and, like Nakamura, is capable of delivering telling crosses to Samaras and Vennegoor of Hesselink.

Strachan's dilemma may be in central midfield, where he may have to decide whether to play someone in the defensive, holding role. Marc Crosas played the part in the absence of the injured Paul Hartley on Saturday, but the young Spaniard is the one man in the squad with no Champions League experience. In a match which seems almost designed for relentless aggression, Strachan may dispense with a "sitting" midfielder and play Scott Brown and Barry Robson, the latter also capable of delivering a goal with his shooting from either a moving or a dead ball.

On the eve of his fourth venture into Europe's premier competition, Strachan was clearly once again stimulated by the prospect, his anticipation of another adrenaline-charged night at Celtic Park heightened by the conviction that his squad may now be better equipped than before to improve an appalling away record. That seems likely to be necessary in a group that also includes Manchester United and Villarreal of Spain.

"As a coach, the Champions League has been invaluable to me," he said. "I've learned one or two wee things and, hopefully, as it all unfolds this season, you'll see things we've been working on in the pre-season being made to count. You ask if our squad is now the best equipped it has been, but that's hard to answer.

"I mean, would I like Neil Lennon still around at his best? Yes, I would. I'd also like Chris Sutton and others who were here when I came still to be here at their best. But we do have a squad who are not brilliant at one particular thing – I mean, they don't go long stretches without conceding, they don't score millions of goals – but they are good at lots of things.

"What I'm saying to opponents is, if you play a certain way, we can find a way of competing with you. And what I've also learned from the Champions League is that it's not as big and scary out there as you first thought. I remember being very nervous at my first group match, which was Manchester United away. I'd been to Old Trafford many times, but with the likes of Southampton and Coventry, you could sneak in and sneak back out.

"But going there with Celtic in the Champions League, the entire world is looking at you. Well, that kind of nervousness is gone. We can compete and, if we could reach the last 16 for the third year in a row, it would make people say, hey, they're pretty consistent, that team."

Few would argue with Strachan's observation that his squad is not capable of conquering the world, but it will be something of a shock if they fail to prise three points from Aalborg.