Malky Mackay insists beating Celtic isn’t mission impossible – and he wants his Ross County players to target Premier Sports Cup success by knocking the holders out on Wednesday.
Ange Postecoglou’s rampant Hoops have just posted their biggest competitive away win – smashing Dundee United 9-0 at Tannadice in the Premiership on Sunday.
It was a scoring defeat which led to United axing boss Jack Ross on Tuesday morning.
Celtic demonstrated passing football at a breathtaking level and are perhaps not the best team for County to face just after losing 4-0 against Rangers at Ibrox in a game they began so well in.
However, County are the only side to score against Celtic in the league this season, with two late goals ending their chances of a draw in a 3-1 league loss in Dingwall earlier this month.
And County have won the League Cup before, and beat the Parkhead club in the semi-finals at Hampden on the way to glory, under Jim McIntyre and Billy Dodds in 2016.
County won League Cup in 2016
Manager Mackay reckons that recent close-run contests against the Scottish champions indicate why his players have to believe they can pull off a shock and reach the third round.
He said: “It’s not an impossible task, because Ross County have won the League Cup in this country in the last decade.
“We have a great picture from that day in the stadium, and I smile every time I walk by it.
“We’re not talking about the 1800s, and the games here against Celtic have been good games.
“We took one to the 97th minute last year, and we took one until the last four minutes this year.
“I know exactly what we’re coming up against. Undoubtedly people are going to want to talk about last Sunday, but we played them two weeks ago, so I know we’re going up against a good team.”
Rangers were full-on against County
County started well against Rangers at the weekend and were furious when, at 0-0, home defender James Sands stayed on the park after a key challenge on striker Jordy Hiwula, having already been booked.
Referee Don Robertson took no action and the Light Blues, who joined Celtic in reaching the Champions League group stages, ran out 4-0 winners.
However, a powerful starting 11, according to Mackay, shows how seriously Ibrox boss Giovanni van Bronckhorst was treating County, last term’s sixth-placed finishers.
Looking again at the midweek Celtic cup clash, he said: “We will look at how they hurt teams, and it will be interesting what team they select.
“I wondered how that would go against Rangers, and I was slightly surprised that it was the full-strength team that beat PSV that got put out against us three days later.
“I guess there’s a bit of credit where our boys are concerned that Rangers felt they had to do that.
“Celtic have us on Wednesday, Rangers on Saturday and then Real Madrid coming up, so it’s a toss-up who’s one, two and three in that.
“We’ll see what their team looks like, but they play in a certain way, in a certain style and in a certain system invariably. We’ll do what we can to upset that.”
Staggies aim to compete with Hoops
County have netted against Celtic on two of their last three trips to Dingwall, losing both games to late goals.
And Mackay is confident his players can ask big questions of the Hoops again.
He added: “We have shown our players experiences of what they’ve done in the past.
“We showed them the game here last year when we took them right to the end, and then the game against Rangers when we drew (3-3 last season).
“We’ve laid gloves on these teams before. There are times you have to hang in the game, but if you do what happened in the last game where we got back in it can happen.
“It was 3–1, but it was pretty tight right up until the last few minutes.
“We know the quality we will be playing against, but I’m really buoyed by my own team’s will to want to take these teams on and not just sit in, but actually go and find way of trying to hurt the opposition as well.”
County will learn from Ibrox clash
And, having sampled the red-hot atmosphere of Ibrox, seven of the Staggies players for the first time, Mackay is confident they will be better for the experience when they tackle Celtic.
He said: “Everyone I brought to the club this summer I talked to about having that experience of going and playing in front of 50,000 people on their CV.
“It is different, you can’t hear people five yards away – I know because I was shouting at them.
“Right now we’re playing against Champions League players, so the test is bigger than it has been over the last four or five years.
“You should want that; you should want to test yourself against the best and experience that so that the next time you’re better.
“For certain parts of the game, we were absolutely that on Saturday. In the first half, their first goal was a deflection, and there was a point we were frustrating them and catching them on the break.”
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