I learn’t a lot when I read this article, because as the season goes on you tend to forget certain things.
The facts and figures behind Ange’s first title
By Joe Sullivan.
The Celts, led by Ange Postecoglou, wrapped up their 10th title of the past 11 years over the past week – an end-of-season finale that culminated with a wonderful Trophy Day celebration that will go down as one of the most memorable in the club’s history.
Over the course of the campaign, there were a whole host of stories, statistics, slogans, scorers and signings that slotted together to bring the SPFL trophy back home to Paradise in the manager’s first season.
Here we take a look at just a few of the facts and figures from a fantastic title camp
GOALDEN SIGNINGS
Of the 92 league goals scored by the champions in the title-winning campaign, no fewer than 67 of them have been scored by 10 of the new Bhoys brought in by Ange Postecoglou. The rundown is Giorgos Giakoumakis 13, Kyogo Furuhashi 12, Liel Abada 10, Jota 10, Daizen Maeda 6, Cameron Carter-Vickers 4, Reo Hatate 4, Matt O’Riley 4, Josip Juranovic 3, and Liam Scales 1.
NO PASARAN
From the 38 league outings, no fewer than 20 of them have delivered clean sheets from the most proficient defence in the country. Saturday’s visitors, Motherwell, failed to score in all four games, and the Hoops had two clean sheets against Dundee United, Hibernian, Ross County, St Johnstone and St Mirren, while Dundee, Hearts, Livingston and Rangers also had non-scoring efforts. Strangely, Aberdeen who finished in 10th place are the only side to score in all three games against the Hoops with results of 2-1, 2-1 and 3-2.
FUN RUN
In the run-in to the title, the Hoops went through the final 32 league games without defeat since a loss at Livingston on September 19. On the journey since then, there have been 26 wins and six draws with the Celts scoring 74 goals for the loss of only 18
MISERLY DEFENCE
No side has scored more than two goals against Celtic in any one league game this term. Aside from the 20 clean sheets, there have been 14 single-goal efforts against the Hoops and only four two-goal games by the opposition. Even then, of those four games, the Celts still won three of them - Dundee 4-2, Aberdeen 3-2 and Dundee again 3-2, with the 2-1 defeat at Tynecastle in the opening game being the only negative. Only 22 goals were scored against the Celts in the 38 games and a goal difference of 70 was attained to Rangers’ 49.
GIORGY BHOY
Top scorer was Giorgos Giakoumakis on 13 goals who just pipped Kyogo Furuhashi on 12 with both scoring doubles on Trophy Day in the 6-0 win over Motherwell. And Celtic finished the day and the entire campaign in style with the Greek striker scoring the final goal with the very last kick of the game, and the season, to edge ahead of his Japanese team-mate by that solitary goal.
STAT ATTACK
Giako also shares the SPFL top scoring spot with Regan Charles-Cook of Ross County with both hitting the 13-mark over the course of the season. Celtic’s Greek goal-getter actually edges ahead of the Englishman in the stats, though, with his strikes coming in only 21 appearances to the Ross County man’s 37 games. Giako’s on-field stats means he scored a goal every 81 minutes he was on the pitch – over a goal-a-game. Kyogo’s on-field stats also bear witness to a fantastic season as he netted a goal for every 101 minutes on the pitch.
TOP CELTS
Celtic used 35 players including three keepers - Joe Hart, Scott Bain (two games) and Vasilas Barkas (one game), and of the 32 outfield players, the 92 goals were shared between 19 of them, and the vast majority of the non-scorers only played a handful of matches. A total of 16 of the 35 played 10 or fewer games. Joe Hart had the most starts, with 35 games played, and he was closely followed by Carl Starfelt with 34 starts, Cameron Carter-Vickers with 33 and Callum McGregor on 32. Liel Abada actually played in 36 of the 38 games with 24 starts and 12 substitute appearances taking him to that tally.
HATS OFF TO THE CHAMPIONS
There were four hat-tricks scored during the campaign with two of them coming in successive home 6-0 league wins, two of them coming against Dundee and two of them scored by Giorgos Giakoumakis. Kyogo Furuhashi got the ball rolling in the hat-trick stakes in the 6-0 win over Dundee in the club’s first home league game, while in the next such match, this time it was David Turnbull scoring half the goals in the same scoreline over St Mirren. Then Giako took over by netting three in a 3-2 home win over Dundee, in February before doing the same against Ross County in what, for the player, were consecutive home league games, with the Hoops winning 4-0 this time.
SHARP SHOOTERS
Celtic’s best scoreline was the 7-0 win over St Johnstone and that was closely followed by no fewer than three 6-0 wins – the first two home games of the campaign and, of course, the Trophy Day 6-0 win over Motherwell to set the celebrations off in the best possible way. There were four games in which the Hoops netted four goals and no fewer than eight matches in which the Celts hit three goals. So those 16 matches accounted for 65 of the 92 league goals.
NEW BHOYS
Ange Postecoglou signed 14 players who made their league debuts in the title-winning campaign and between them they accounted for no fewer than 302 appearances over the course of the 38 games. Top of the list is Liel Abada with his aforementioned 36 outings in the league, while, at the other end of the scale, Liam Shaw, who spent the bulk of the term on loan at Motherwell where he made eight appearances, made one appearance by coming on for the final 10 minutes of the 0-0 draw at St Mirren in December.
I’m a sort of stats geek, so of course I loved this piece. 
If you’ve already seen this article, you might ask where are the photo’s? Well, I decided to remove them, and just concentrate solely on the stats.
