Chris Sutton believes that the absence of defender Jozo Simunovic really showed on Wednesday night as Celtic suffered a heavy defeat to Bayern Munich in the Champions League group stages.
The Bhoys were without the 23-year-old as he continues to recover from injury and they could have done with his presence at the back.
Brendan Rodgers’ team were blown away 3-0 by Bayern at the Allianz Stadium, with Thomas Muller, Joshua Kimmich and Mats Hummels in the scoresheet.
The Scottish champions were unable to get to grips with the German opposition and were well beaten.
Sutton feels that missing centre-back Simunovic was a big blow and stood out as one of the factors in their defeat.
“3-0 Bayern Munich. Move on. Tough at top level. Missed Simunovic and the inability to bring another centre half in costly,” Sutton wrote on his personal Twitter account.
.@btsportfootball 3-0 Bayern Munich??Move on..Tough at top level.Missed Simunovic and the inability to bring another centre half in costly?
— Chris Sutton (@chris_sutton73) October 18, 2017
Simunovic has not featured for Celtic since September due to his hamstring injury and is usually a constant feature in the starting XI.
The Bosnian is a powerhouse defender that dominate the back-line and is one of Rodgers’ first names on the team-sheet.
He had hoped to make a return to action against Bayern on Wednesday night, but didn’t travel with the squad.
Celtic were left with a centre-back combination of Mikael Lustig and Dedryck Boyata to face Bayern and the pair were unable to keep out their opponents.