Source: FOOTYMAD
Lennon Sees Positives
Despite losing 2-0 Neil Lennon is not despondent ahead of Sunday Neil Lennon saw some positives from last night's defeat by Athletico Madrid which he will use ahead of Sunday's meeting with Rangers. Celtic were still getting used to their surroundings at the Vicente Calderon when Colombia striker Radamel Falcao met a Diego corner in the third minute to head past Fraser Forster. Diego added the second in the 67th minute to complete the misery that leaves Celtic with one away win in Europe in 31 games. However, the ebullient Lennon said: "I don't think there will be any hangover for Sunday's game. The players are relishing it and I am looking for a similar type of performance as tonight. I thought we played very well. It was a poor start again and we lost a goal from a set-piece but Gary (Hooper) had the chance to equalise and you have to take chances at this level. Hopefully the players will take something from the game for Sunday because there were positives. We will just rest now. I don't think we need to do any training. We will make sure we are well rested and will have a recovery session in the morning. But we want to play in these European games and there should be momentum going in to Sunday's game." Lennon was disappointed to see his men lose another goal early in a game on their European travels. He said: "It was the manner of the goal. We work very hard on set-pieces and we haven't put a decent challenge in. I felt we could have played higher up the pitch but we did that in the second half. The second goal was a killer goal. It was during our best spell in the game, and after that we had to throw caution to the wind." Atletico boss Gregorio Manzano denied Lennon's claim that the referee Peter Rasmussen had allowed some cynical tackles from Madrid to escape the proper punishment. He said: "No, the referee let the game flow. I don't think he favoured one team or the other. Celtic kept things tight in the first half but as they tired in the second half we managed to make more of the game. At least one thing people will say is that we have started scoring after two blanks in league games. We didn't change anything, same tactics, but it is good that we have broken that run."
