Sorting Quality From The Form Flan-nel

A macro view on what should be an egg-citing League Cup final

As we build up to the League Cup final most supporters are exercised by current form, and certainly, there is much giddiness to be mined at Ibrox on the back of some domestic routs and impressive European jousts.

With Celtic, the current feeling is of managing through a packed schedule of matches. Over the last 11 ties, Brendan Rodgers has made 40 lineup changes (3.6 changes per match).

This isn’t because of injury but to spread the playing burden amongst his squad.

That will have an impact on cohesion and consistency.

Across the SPFL campaign, Rodgers averages 3.2 line-up changes per league game, whilst Phillipe Clement makes 2.8.

Consider also how teams are now setting up against Celtic given the start to the season whereby a single loss has been experienced by mid-December.

We have seen a spate of mid-blocks with teams engaging in heavy pressing from halfway onwards.

In the recent run of fixtures, we have seen Kilmarnock (232), Heart of Midlothian (224), Aberdeen (277) and Dinamo Zagreb (206) all work incredibly hard pressing Celtic within this structure.

Celtic’s response has been patience and control, and this has yielded only one goal conceded (a worldy from outside the box at Tynecastle) with three wins and an away Champions League draw to show for it.

Many changes, some of the hardest away ground to visit, and a tough schedule are reasonable mitigation for prosaic and studied football.

And in fairness, The Rangers have had a similarly tough workload albeit recent wins have come against the likes of St Johnstone, Ross County, an abject Kilmarnock at home, and Nice’s youth team! Bantz alert!

All this preamble is to place the current “form” into context before embarking on a more macro view of the teams.

For this, I will use the six-match rolling expected goal difference.