Liam Scales goal gives Celtic narrow win over Kilmarnock
Celtic beat Kilmarnock 1-0 at Celtic Park through a first-half Liam Scales goal, a much tighter result than the sides' previous meeting in August.
By Harvey Watkins,
Celtic beat Kilmarnock 1-0 at Celtic Park on Sunday, with Liam Scales scoring the only goal of the game in the 26th minute. A single moment in the first half settled the match, and the score stayed that way until the final whistle.
Scales settles it in the first half
Scales put Celtic in front in the first half, and neither side scored again. The home side's lead held for the rest of the match. One goal is a slender cushion at any stage, and this one had to survive the whole of the second half.
For Celtic, the outcome was a win and a clean sheet. For Kilmarnock, it was a defeat by the narrowest margin there is, which is a different thing from being beaten heavily. A side that loses 1-0 is still in the contest until the end. That is worth recording even though the result went against them.
A contrast with August
The two clubs met earlier in the season, on 9 August, when Celtic won 5-1 away to Kilmarnock. That was a far more emphatic result, and it makes Sunday's scoreline stand out. Celtic won on both occasions, but the gap between the sides on the day was much smaller at Celtic Park than it had been in the first meeting.
There are a couple of ways to read that. One is that Kilmarnock tightened up considerably between the two games, conceding once rather than five times. Another is that a single match is a noisy measure. Scorelines between the same teams can swing for reasons that have nothing to do with any lasting change. Both readings are available, and two results are not enough to choose firmly between them.
What can be said is this. Kilmarnock scored in August and did not on Sunday, while Celtic scored far more freely in the first meeting than the second. On these two games, at least, the fixture has moved towards a tighter contest.
What the result does and does not show
A 1-0 win is a complete result in itself: the team that scored once and conceded nothing took the match. Beyond that, a single scoreline says little. It does not tell you which side had the better of the play, or whether the margin flattered either of them. It would be a stretch to draw broad conclusions about either club from one match.
For Celtic, the record against Kilmarnock this season is straightforward. They have won both meetings, and on Sunday they did so without conceding. For Kilmarnock, the more encouraging detail is how much closer they ran Celtic the second time. Whether that reflects something durable will only become clear when the sides meet again.