Journalist Tony Haggerty labelled Celtic’s Kyogo Furuhashi as a ‘forlorn figure’ in their Scottish League Cup clash with Kilmarnock.
It finished 2-0 to the Hoops thanks to goals from Daizen Maeda and a late strike from Georgios Giakoumakis to take them to the final of the competition.
Furuhashi will be disappointed not to get on the scoresheet, though he did put the ball in the back of the net only for it to be ruled out for offside.
Writing for The Celtic Way, Haggerty said that the forward ‘seemed to struggle to adapt to the conditions’ and lost his footing ‘many times’ on a frustrating day for the Japanese ace.
He said: “Celtic’s talismanic striker cut a forlorn figure in attack in the first half and seemed to struggle to adapt to the conditions as he lost his footing many times. However, his pass to his compatriot who thought he had scored a second was absolutely sublime only for VAR to intervene once again when he was harshly flagged for offside.”
TIF Thoughts on Haggerty’s comments…
Furuhashi may have had something of a day to forget, but the Hoops faithful will be more focused on the fact they’re one step closer to lifting the Scottish League Cup.
Furthermore, the Japanese forward has certainly been no slouch in a Celtic jersey, this season alone he’s bagged 15 goals in 19 league appearances.
This is an improvement on his strong tally last season where he finished as the second-highest goalscorer in the Scottish Premiership, scoring 12 times in just 20 games.
He also ranks in the top-performing Celtic players based on Sofascore’s average league rating with a score of 7.16, tied with midfielder Callum McGregor.
It’s clear Furuhashi is a top performer for Postecoglou, so fans will hope it’s a one-off and that he’ll be in the firing line when they host St Mirren on Wednesday.