Mammoth Maeda

Daizen Maeda’s run over his last six games at Celtic will probably go down in the history books as legendary.

8 goals and an assist make him the singular person most responsible for securing a Double for the 2025-2026 season, and it is not particularly close, in my opinion.

What a way to potentially wrap up his 5th season at the club!

As far as the league season went, Maeda registered first in xG, non-penalty xG, had the highest xG per shot, 2nd most shots, 2nd most goals, 3rd most xA, 2nd most xA from open play, the most pressures (778 vs 505 by Nygren in 2nd!), regains from pressure, counterpressures, and regains from counterpressures.

Did the storybook ending to his Celtic career see him cast as a somewhat surprising hero given the nature of his goal scoring rampage?

From his tap in off a rebound as the 4th goal in the comfortable 4-0 win versus Dundee United on January 10, 2026, Maeda posted exactly 1 goal scoring contribution, an assist against Bologna on January 22, 2026, until the beginning of his outburst on April 25, 2026, against Falkirk.

In fact, I would argue that his most recent “big goal” prior to that Falkirk game was his headed goal in the 11th minute against Dundee on December 3, 2026. However, that was only a “big goal” in retrospect given it was against Dundee at home so early in the game.

His last match winning goal, obvious at the time, was his diving header to secure 3-points in the 2nd minute of extra time in the 2nd half in the 3-2 win over Motherwell on October 5, 2025, or nearly 7 months prior to the Falkirk game.

Based upon the logic I having been seeing from some regarding Alan’s KMI-related analysis on the latest Huddle Breakdown flagship episode, Celtic did not win the league without…Michel-Ange Balikwisha!