Source: Team_Talk
Strachan basking in glory of victory
Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink confirmed his return to form by scoring his fourth goal in four games to take his tally for the season to six and Scott McDonald's 18th of the campaign just after the break gave the champions a comfortable win over the weak Pittodrie men at Parkhead on Saturday.
The convincing win put pressure on chasing Rangers for their trip to Easter Road - but the Ibrox men responded with a 3-2 win to narrow the gap to one point again.
When the five post-split SPL fixtures were announced immediately afterwards, the Hoops discovered they would face Aberdeen and Rangers away in their first two games.
A home game against Dundee United will be followed by a trip to play Hibernian before they welcome Hearts to Parkhead in the last game of the season.
While the post-split fixtures will be discussed and analysed to see which Old Firm side have the edge in the run-in, Strachan is determined to focus only on his side's performance against the Dons.
He shrugged off a show of petulance from McDonald which left him, rather fortuitously, with only a booking from Dougie McDonald.
The Australian had carried on his prolonged verbal attack on the referee after initially complaining about a foul from Scott Severin, and he welcomed Vennegoor of Hesselink back to scoring form.
The former Coventry and Southampton boss is hoping Celtic fans will join him in enjoying the fruits of the weekend's labour before he turns his attention to the trip to Pittodrie in a fortnight's time.
"People got full value for money and I think we all enjoyed it," Strachan said.
"We have the onus to perform which we did and the fans saw a lot of exciting football and one very good goal.
"We had a big week and a big build-up and what we had to do at training, we did it well.
"So if you get a performance like that then you should enjoy it for a while."
On the evidence of Saturday's encounter, Celtic will have nothing to fear from their next meeting with the Dons on May 2.
Jimmy Calderwood's men, without banned Lee Miller and injured Darren Mackie, never really looked like troubling the champions and the Dons boss accepts his side, who trail third-placed Hearts by six points, probably need to win their remaining five games to overtake the Tynecastle side.
He said: "We had Miller and Mackie out and we couldn't make a fist of it, even in the second half when we had two men up front.
We done okay and knocked the ball about but we weren't going to cause them any problems.
"When you come to Glasgow to play against Celtic or Rangers you have to get in amongst them and I don't think we did that.
"It was comfortable for them."
