Celtic have signed Australian international Marco Tilio. 

The 21-year-old attacker becomes Brendan Rodgers' second signing since his return to Parkhead following the recent arrival of midfielder Odin Thiago Holm. 

Celtic's head of recruitment, Mark Lawwell, is believed to have used his City Group connections to identify Tilio.

This scouting report will take a closer look at Tilio, analysing his data, identifying his playing style, highlighting his key strengths and areas for improvement and assessing how he will fit in at Celtic. 

Player profile 

Born in Sydney, Tilio came through the ranks at local side A-League side Sydney FC where he made his professional debut in May 2019. 

After just a handful of appearances for Sydney, Tilio signed for Melbourne City in September 2020. He has since gone on to make 67 appearances for the City Football Group-owned club, scoring 20 goals and providing 15 assists (Wyscout). 

He already has seven Socceroos caps to his name and was part of their World Cup squad, although he didn’t manage to get any minutes on the pitch in Qatar. 

Tilio has just finished his most productive season in the A-League. He had his highest-scoring campaign to date with ten goals, laying on a further four as he helped Melbourne top the 2022-23 A-League standings. 

Tilio and Melbourne failed to make it three Australian Championships in a row though, after they suffered a shock defeat in the Grand Final against Central Coast Mariners.  

A versatile attacking player, Tilio has played across the front line in his career and also as a central attacking midfielder. 

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According to Wyscout, this season he has been used mostly off the right (1,452 mins) in Melbourne’s 4-1-4-1/4-2-3-1 set-up, but he has also played minutes off the left (967 mins) and as a centre forward in two games as well (141 mins). 

Although Wyscout has him down as right-footed, Tilio seems stronger on his left but, as we will see later, he is still more than capable off his right too, whether that be shooting, passing or dribbling. 

At 5’7” and 10 and a half stone, Tilio is on the smaller side but, as can be seen later on in this report, he compensates for any physical disadvantage with his agility, quickness, and technical skills. 

The above chart uses Wyscout per-90 data converted into percentile ranks to compare Tilio to other wingers and central attacking midfielders in the 2022-23 A-League (minimum 1,000 minutes played). This can start to build a clearer picture of his playing style. The chart is split into three sections and includes several key attacking, possession and defending metrics.

In the attacking section, Tilio’s impressive goal-scoring season sees him rank highly for goal contributions. His ten league goals, all from open play, have worked out at 0.4 per 90, while his four assists work out at 0.16 per 90, giving him a very respectable combined average goal contribution of over one every two games (0.56 per 90). 

His expected goals value isn’t quite as high, mostly down to a slight overperformance in terms of goals, generating 0.29 xG per 90 compared to his actual 0.4 goals per 90.  His expected assists (0.16 xA per 90) are around his actual assist output. 

Tilio is a high-volume shooter compared to his peers in the A-League, attempting 2.57 per 90. In the 75th percentile, he also gets a good amount on target (43.75 per cent).  He does not attempt a massive amount of crosses, 2.45 per 90, and only has an accuracy rate of 19.67 per cent. 

Finally, on the attacking section, Tilio ranks highly for touches in the box, 4.5 per 90. Given he played as an attacker in a dominant team in the league, this is perhaps to be expected. 

Moving into the possession section, Tilio’s dribbling stands out. He ranks highly for volume, 6.91 per 90 with a 57.56 success rate while he also clocked an average of 4.54 progressive runs, a carry that takes a player’s team considerably closer to the goal per 90. 

Carrying certainly seems to be Tilio's preferred method of ball progression, as he doesn’t rank as highly for progressive passes (3.74 per 90) as he does for progressive runs. 

The final metric in the possession section is dangerous passes, a combination of through passes and key passes. Here, Tilio ranks in the 60th percentile mark, so just above average, producing 1.4 of these types of passes per 90. 

The last section, defending, shows Tilio just below average for the number of defensive duels he is involved in compared to other wingers and central attacking midfielders in Australia’s top flight (4.82 per 90). His success rate of 50.83 per cent is just inside the bottom quartile. 

Tilio made an impressive 3.83 PAdj interceptions per 90 in last season’s A-League, though, which places him in the top quartile for that defensive metric. 

Attacking

Tilio’s shooting numbers stood out in the percentile rank chart and the below graphic, which maps all of his shots from the last calendar year, gives further insight into his shooting.

Most of his efforts have come from inside the box, where he has a 17 per cent conversion rate. There is a small scattering of shots from outside the box too. These shots are only just on the edge, in central areas, with Tilio clearly a threat at these distances. He has two goals from outside the box in the last calendar year and has hit the target with six of his other 15 efforts from this range. 

The graphic shows Tilio has taken most of his shots off his left (40) in the last year but he also took plenty (26) of his right too. 

His shooting technique is clean, and he can generate good power and accuracy from both inside and outside the penalty area. He is certainly more effective off his left, though, as in the below example against his former club Sydney FC. 

Following a brilliant dribble from inside his own half, more on that in the next section, Tilio hit a powerful strike into the left corner that gave the goalkeeper no chance. 

He is still more than capable off his right too, such as in the next example from a game against Perth Glory.

After cutting in from the left, Tilio struck a well-placed effort with his ‘weaker’ right that wrong-footed the goalkeeper and nestled in the bottom left corner. 

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A threat from further out, he demonstrates an ability to get into the box to get on the end of moves too. In these situations, Tilio often shows good composure, such as in the below example from an AFC Champions League match. 

Receiving a cutback around the penalty spot, Tilio’s first touch took the pace off the ball and got the ball out of his feet. Remaining calm, he then slotted the ball home at the near post despite pressure from defenders. 

The above graphic, which maps his deliveries into the box, gives further insight into Tilio as an attacking threat. Admittedly he has played often on the right but this graphic does indicate he is more of a threat coming in from that side. Although he carried into the box more from the left, his pass accuracy from the right side has been higher and he has produced more key passes from that area of the pitch too. 

As alluded to in his percentile rank chart, this graphic also further highlights crossing as being a potential area for improvement for Tilio – of his 22 crosses into the penalty area in the last year, just three have found a team-mate. 

Possession

Tilio is technically gifted and demonstrates excellent ball control, close dribbling, and quick feet. He possesses great balance and agility, allowing him to manoeuvre through traffic at ease and beat defenders in one-on-one situations. 

His close control with either foot, combined with his decent level of pace, makes him particularly dangerous when cutting inside. As seen in some of the previous attacking examples, Tilio prefers to cut inside and take his man on rather than hitting the by-line to get crosses in.

The below graphic shows all of Tilio’s dribbles in the last year.

The map shows he made just under four successful dribbles per 90 in the last calendar year with his ball-carrying abilities resulting in 26 shots on target for Melbourne. A total of nine of his side’s goals in the last year were a direct result of Tilio’s dribbling, with one of those shown in the below example, an away game at Newcastle Jets.

Receiving a long diagonal pass from the back, Tilio sucks in the defender before popping the ball down the side of him, showing excellent agility to skip around him to directly attack the space in behind at pace. 

Once in the box, he rolls the ball along the six-yard for team-mate, former Hibs striker Jamie MacLaren to tap in at the back post. 

Although he ranked above average for dangerous passes (through passes and key passes) in his percentile rank chart, one area Tilio could also improve on is his passing in and around the box, particularly his weight of pass. He can at times be guilty of overhitting that final pass. 

Defending

The final area of Tilio’s game to assess in greater detail is his ability off-the-ball. With Celtic likely to continue to deploy a high-intensity pressing system under Rodgers, as they did under Ange Postecoglou, Tilio will be expected to contribute without the ball too. 

This shouldn’t be too much of a change for Tilio, given Melbourne were the most intense pressing team in last season’s A-League, registering the lowest PPDA, passes allowed per defensive action (8.7 per 90). 

The above graphic can give some further information about Tilio’s work out of possession for Melbourne, specifically in the final third. 

Encouragingly, Tilio ranks towards the top end here for both recoveries in the final third (2.09 per 90) and dangerous recoveries (0.76 per 90) with one of his recoveries in the last year leading directly to a goal. 

These high numbers for recoveries may be as much down to Melbourne’s approach, but Tilio, despite his lack of physicality, has definitely played his part off-the-ball, such as in the below example.  

Here, he quickly reacts to a move breaking down inside the opposition box. With both the goalkeeper and defender hesitating, Tilio nips around the side to win the ball on the touchline.  

This gives him the opportunity for a shot at goal which was saved by the goalkeeper at his near post on this occasion. 

Conclusion

A highly skilled technician with excellent dribbling attributes and an eye for goal, Tilio is a very exciting acquisition. 

He possesses much of what is of a Celtic winger and for a reported fee of around £1m, he also fits the bill in terms of an undervalued talent in an emerging market.

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He may not have the blistering pace or offer the same threat in behind as one of the club's current primary options on the right, Liel Abada, but Tilio is a different profile, one who is far more technically astute than the Israeli. His ability to cut inside, beat his man 1-vs-1 and will certainly add a different dimension to Celtic’s right side.  

Should Rodgers opt to utilise an out-and-out central attacking midfielder, then Tilio’s skillset would make him a decent option in that area of the pitch too. 

Of course, the worry may be a worry about the standard of the A-League but Tilio really is a standout in his current surroundings. If he can translate what he has produced in Australia in Scotland, then Celtic will have a top talent on their hands.