Celtic throttle another domestic opponent but Kyogo Furuhashi's isolation gives cause for concern

Goals from Jota and Callum McGregor, either side of Lewis Ferguson's penalty, meant Ange Postecoglou's side returned to winning ways after a midweek defeat away to Bayer Leverkusen in the Europa League.

The manager made two changes to the starting line-up from the game at the BayArena with James Forrest and Nir Bitton dropping out in favour of Liel Abada and James McCarthy.

Here, The Celtic Way looks at the StatsBomb data from the game to give you a match report experience like no other.

Trendline

Christian Ramirez's blindsiding of Joe Hart was the most action in either goalmouth across the opening 15 minutes, but Celtic started to gradually make small inroads creatively.

They took the lead through Jota in the 20th minute and had a few more efforts before the half, with Stephen Welsh's header the main chance to net again.

After the break more (generally low-quality) attempts meant their cumulative xG slowly built up to more than two.

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At times it felt like the Hoops struggled to implement their press effectively but it must be said that did not have much of an impact on chances for the opposition. Aberdeen's afternoon was characterised by flatlining outside of the penalty (which accounted for almost 90 per cent of their cumulative xG).

Celtic performed about as expected in front of goal based on the chances created, while the Dons slightly overperformed. In that respect, the hosts would have won this match 70 per cent of the time.

Shots

As the shot map shows, Celtic's attempts came mostly in the box but rarely from the preferred close, central locations. They also struggled from distance with seven of their eight shots from outside the box blocked.

That said, while creatively Celtic struggled to find Kyogo despite his persistent running, they did manufacture a clutch of decent chances.

The best of those was statistically Liel Abada's 59th-minute effort which was saved by Joe Lewis.

If you were wondering, McGregor's goal in the immediate aftermath of that attempt was rated a curiously high 0.11 xG despite it ricocheting off him from Jonny Hayes' attempted clearance.

Aberdeen, conversely, were limited to four with one of those Ferguson's penalty.

Of their three open-play attempts, two were long-rangers and the one they did garner from a favourable area was blocked (a nod here for having a man on the post, not least him actually managing to clear it).

Passing, possession and positions

Kyogo's isolation on the pass network is no surprise.

Besides Hart he is the only Celtic player displayed in a cool colour - which is not to say he was ineffective (pressing stats are to come, after all) but the lack of pass attempts to take advantage of his running must frustrate the Japan international.

Elsewhere, Celtic's average positions shape is largely as expected with both full-backs pushed up, McCarthy the deepest midfielder and the McGregor-Turnbull axis occupying the advanced spaces between him and Kyogo.

Aberdeen spent the first half largely in shape defensively, with the exception of Jack Gurr at right-back. His notably high position perhaps helps explain why Jota had so much space in the opening 45, with Celtic attempting several long balls to the Portuguese to exploit this.

In addition, the three Dons midfielders stayed relatively compact in an attempt to prevent Celtic from playing through central areas, although Scott Brown's role is deserving of a special mention.

The former Parkhead skipper's average position may be smack bang in the middle of Ferguson and Dylan McGeouch but he often performed a hybrid role, dropping back to create a back three/five before returning to midfield to match up numerically as the Dons looked to pass out of Celtic's press while simultaneously disrupt attempts to release Kyogo.

That said, Brown was forced off due to injury after 66 minutes - by which time Celtic had already scored their second and were arguably looking better value going forward than the opening half anyway.

Indeed, their pass network for the second half shows a significant upturn in warm colours and slightly thicker passing lines, which dovetails with the impression that Celtic's movement had started to cause more problems.

James Forrest's introduction added urgency on the right which helped in that regard, but also of note is the almost gravitational pull of other players towards the left (and, thus, Jota). 

In amongst Celtic's 61 per cent possession was almost 600 completed passes; McGregor topped the xGChain while Juranovic garnered the most touches overall.

Four of the hosts' top five most common passing combinations were between members of the defence, with McGregor to Juranovic the only outlier. 

Pressing and defending

While his attacking output in terms of shooting and passing definitely took a hit - for the second time in a week against a team well-drilled defensively - Kyogo's impact in terms of off-ball work-rate was not dampened and he was by far Celtic's 'leading' presser.

Anthony Ralston's persistence in such matters was displayed in his notable duration per pressure (a match-high) and total pressure duration (second to Kyogo) while it was a similar story in counter-pressing.

McGregor took that mantle for numbers alone but Ralston's total duration (a gargantuan 15.3) and duration per pressure were both match-highs.

Despite Ralston's individual numbers, in general the pressure heatmaps suggest the match was played more intensely on the opposite flank; the Hoops' tendency to seek out  Jota perhaps again shining through.

Defensively, McCarthy stood out with a team-high five interceptions. He married this to two tackles, a clearance, winning the only aerial duel he competed for and boasting a flawless tackled/dribbled past percentage.

Elsewhere, Cameron Carter-Vickers continued his fine form with a pair of tackles and interceptions along with three clearances and four out of four aerial duel wins as Celtic's effective throttling of opponents domestically continued.