Sandman’s Definitive Ratings – Celtic at The Overlook Hotel

In partnership with

The Celtic Star

·24 November 2024

Sandman’s Definitive Ratings – Celtic at The Overlook Hotel

SANDMAN’S DEFINITIVE RATINGS: CELTIC @ THE OVERLOOK HOTEL…

“No place is ever as bad as they tell you it’s going to be. Except Swinecastle. It really is.” – Chuck Thompson, the greatest rogue travel writer.

Kasper Schmeichel. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

THE FRIENDLY GHOST – 6.5/10 – ExKasperated with a strange first-half where he had some straight forward stops but must have felt a Killie siege reprise was forthcoming. His second-half felt more normal, still throwing in a fine parry or two but was more in-synch with the defence around him as they combined to thwart the Diets. No chance with their fizzing consolation strike.

Video OneFootball

Greg Taylor. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

GREGGS THE BAKER – 6.5/10 – Pastry all over the place, more dough on the floor than in the bread – a metaphor best describing Gregg’s first quarter of the game until he found his touch. Then, in a series of cupcake moments we had something finally baking down the left. As the game grew deeper so did his involvement and influence. A fine organiser is Greggs, taking care of details and tidying up.

Alistair Johnston. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

WAYNE GRETZKY – 6.5/10 – Tough opening 45, faced with sprightly enthusiastic opponents and the unsettling ugliness of the baying monkey mob in that Gorgie shed throwing insults and their own dung at him every time we got a shy. But The Moose is used to combating grizzlies and obese backpackers in his neck of the woods, so as the game wore on his endurance overcame their aggression and the fabled link-up with The ‘RACoon produced a duo to rival Rocky and Bullwinkle. It eventually had them strangled and pinned back, letting The ‘RACoon loose, until The Moose’s lungs and legs gave-in and a hirsute lumberjack wearing a checkered over-shirt and deerstalker hat picked him off with a Smith & Wesson Model 1854 lever-action Moose-killer.*

*was subbed.

Auston Tursty. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

CRUSTY THE CLOWN – 7/10 – Thankfully, as the toil of the first-half gave them far too much blue sky and – like that titular gender-bender cringing uber-woke social media platform – it took our trusted Trusty to censor their cheek. Athleticism is his forte and our benefit. He’ll make it into challenges and blocks you thought he was a pace off. It’s a coin flip between him and Liam for the sidekick defensive role; either gives me no stress.

Cameron Carter-Vickers. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

GET CARTER – 7.5/10 – Another Big Mhan to stand up to the scampering bat-finks of old Gorgie Road. Some solid blocks at crucial times; with his American crime-fighting partner we at least had security as the barriers in front of them intermittently failed to rebuke advances. The immovable object resisting their force.

Callum McGregor. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

CALMAC – 5.5/10 – Still on a beach somewhere for the entire opening spell. Pick-pocketed continually by their fevered wretches tearing around the middle, it appeared our conductor had misplaced his baton in some sunny cocktail glass and there was no tempo, directive or orchestration around our possession until after the break. And even then he semi-abdicated the position of commander-in-chief to the silken boots and bonce of Reo, satisfied in his own below-par outing that he’d play support act for this one. Highlight of his night was a skilful assist for the opener, somehow curving the attempted clearance right into Kyogo’s path. With his baws…

Arne Engels. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

THE TERMINATOR – 5/10 – Punishment detail for Arne – shuttle-run like a warrior between their lines, open for a ball you’ll never receive. Dysfunctional midfield blunted him entirely. And by the time we did get on top and creative he was, as they say in all the best Vietnamese knocking-shops, knackered from his Belgian exploits.

Reo Hatate. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

HAKUNA HATATE – 8/10 MOTM – Reo appeared less doped-up than others with plenty of bright moments through the drudge of the first 45. You just kept hoping he’d spark properly alight and not fade. So enter the second, enter the dragon – he was the one to turn the buggery on the hillbillies, so to speak. Deft balls into deadly areas, shifting his feet like he was shuffling a deck of cards to set up Idah’s first; Silken moments of match-winning guile and phenomenal energy input from the globetrotting match-winner.

LORD KATSUMOTO – 6/10 – Vroom-vroom, clunk. Vroom-vroooooommmm…Clunk. Never got a proper service back in Japan, and tonight had a good old tussle with their rangy fullback. Was most admired for charging about sticking a few on them, notably Aussie bush rat (Rattus fuscipes) Devlin, whose greetin’-faced bleating went down nicely with a cold Guinness. Never hit the Daizen heights, but avoided the lows, and that pace combined with Kuhn’s to seal the apostates’ fate. Look upon it all as a nice warm-up for the CL.

Kyogo. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

KILLER MUSHROOM – 7/10 – Yes! No! Yup, ach. YASSS!!! Ping-ponged them all night, zipping between both skaterboy junkie centre-backs and finally got his reward which he took in typical razor-edged Kyogo fashion, despite being blocked initially by former Hoops shot-stopper supreme CG. The wee mhan fairly spun and knifed that rebound in. Another title-crucial goal.

Nicolas Kuhn. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

TAKINTE – 7.5/10 – The German Jinky savages your aesthetic senses with a Playstation FIFA breakaway goal of exquisite thrilling satisfaction. Daizen, Kuhn…Daizen, Kuhn…BOOM! That memorable highlight aside, we knew the moment was lingering somewhere at the periphery of sensation as he’d drifted, threatened, and teased numerous times before his classy feet lit up those gloomy Jack-The-Ripper- Era-Whitehall surroundings.

SUBS –

Yang arrives at Tynecastle. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

YING – N/A – Koreans love video games. Fact. Greatest E=Sports players on the globe. Although sometimes they get carried away with VR and confused with actual reality. They’ve even been known to attempt to physically insert themselves into a virtual world, TRON-like, by climbing through screens. Or launching themselves head-first into LED advertising boards…

SAINT BERNARDO – N/A – Some neat footwork from the reliable Portuguese youngster who’ll probably get a start midweek. Quick wits to lay-on Idah.

Adam Idah. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

DUNCAN IDAHO – 7/10 – What more can one do? Fine dispatch past a top keeper not once but twice and may have had three. A big unit, and one that’s a major asset when fit and focussed, with zip. Sharpness is his most crucial attribute; honed, he’s the 9 million quid powerhouse raider. Dulled, he’s a flaming carthorse one stumble from the glue factory. Stay frosty.

Idah, Forrest and Yang. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

JAMESY – 6/10 – Another multiple pumping in Edinburgh of a Saturday night for the Prestwick Pele. And he also got a wee cameo on the football park too, for a few minutes to dazzle and win a penalty. The night resounded with the contract news that Jamesy’s got an extension. I can tell you there’s a few Prestwick glass collectors have know that for a while…

Anthony Ralston. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

TONY THE TIGER – N/A – Emboldened by his triumphant Scotland role in Poland, Tony swaggered on for ten minutes and coolly played a one-two with his own post; none given from The Brickie.

Brendan Rodgers. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

THE NOTAPRODDYGAL – 7/10 – A relieved man. Another tricky reboot after those international breaks. And it took until his half-time tweaks for the system to begin to process properly again. And even at that, not all the nodes were parsing, or something-something computer-nerdy analagous to that… So, alternatively – in good old 1960s parlance, BR eventually got the tune out the flamin’ whistle and we march on; not in any morbidly obese genetic-defect way with big drums, wee lassies’ twirly sticks and kitchen pinnies on, but in that swashbuckling Hoops glory manner.

Replacement linesman. Hearts v Celtic, Scottish Premiership, Tynecastle. 23 November 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

MIBBERY – 2/10 – There must have been a frisson of unhealthy excitement in the MIBs half-time conclave; zero to zero as they like to say in their rigid important lingo. When would the big chance come to scupper the Bhoys? Well, wait they shall. Their angst-filled second period must have been a deflating experience as not once did the controversy they rely on to cover sabotage express itself. It all got too much for some and a linesman eventually ran away up the tunnel in tears, causing a comical delay as we awaited the arrival of a replacement hastily extracted from the nearest Ludge. And rather forlornly, all they took home the consolation, ‘At Least We Booked A Japanese in The Name Of The Empire’ trophy.

OVERALL – 7/10 – Well, there’s contrasts in the Capital – shimmering festive lights and vibrant Xmas markets down Princes Street beneath the classic Castle panorama. Then there’s the darker byways and alleys. The kind that inspired J.K Rowling (babe, would…) to write about haunted forests, basilisks and dementors – Gorgie. A Godless pit where the denizens can’t even communicate in words – it’s all howls and hand gestures. Never a comfortable midden to visit, but in blew The Hoops out of Storm Bert(ie Auld) and left plenty of damage they’ll not have insurance for.

We huffed and puffed and if we’d blown their house down it would look a lot better. We settled for eviscerating them in 45 second-half minutes, featuring a goal that was a hurricane blow in itself as our twin tornadoes swept up the park at gale force speed and took the roof off the net. Twister on that, ya…So after trolling the watching Sheep and Zombies for 45 minutes the Bhoys got their art together, even if it was quite abstract in patches, and left us a thoughtful piece of work that delighted in many ways, if not a Leipzig-era masterpiece.

Two treacherous away league trips in a row either side of the annoying hiatus, beautifully negotiated; that naughty fixtures supercomputer at SPFL HQ will fry a few circuits trying to come up with a double-header like that again.

Screw ’em. CL here we come.

Go Away Now

Sandman