celtic climb into contention published: wednesday 5 november 2003, 23.00cet
celtic fc 3-1 rsc anderlecht a vital victory moves martin o'neill's side second in group a.
by alex o'henley at celtic park
celtic fc moved into second place in uefa champions league group a with a crucial 3-1 victory at home to rsc anderlecht.
vital victory the glasgow side began the night bottom of the section with three points but the victory took them above their opponents and fc bayern münchen, who suffered a 2-1 defeat at home to olympique lyonnais. the french champions now lead the group with seven points, one more than celtic.
tactical change celtic manager martin o'neill changed his favoured 3-5-2 lineup, opting instead to play a 4-4-2 formation with didier agathe at full-back. liam miller came in to make his first champions league start on the right side of midfield.
early incident as expected the home side were the first to threaten but the anderlecht defence, so impressive in their 1-0 win against celtic in belgium on matchday 3, coped comfortably with the early pressure despite the absence of suspended captain glen de boeck, who was sent off two weeks ago.
mcnamara intervenes the belgian champions then went on the attack and almost capitalised on some slack celtic defending, as a ball across the penalty area was misjudged by stanislav varga and the home side's captain, jackie mcnamara, was forced to intervene to prevent ivica mornar getting a clear shot at goal.
celtic in front the early scare seemed to jolt celtic into life and in the 12th minute henrik larsson put the home side ahead. john hartson did well to shield the ball in midfield before playing the ball into the path of agathe, and his perfect cross was headed past daniel zitka by the swedish striker for his first champions league goal of the campaign.
miller magic the goal lifted the 60,000-strong crowd, who urged the hosts forward in search of a second, which duly arrived in the 17th minute. mcnamara's inswinging cross from the left was headed back across goal by hartson to the feet of miller, and the 22-year-old forward's low shot gave zitka no chance.
sutton strikes miller was a constant threat now and minutes later he helped to create celtic's third. another surging run took him into the anderlecht penalty area before his high cross from the goalline found stilian petrov unmarked at the back post, but the bulgarian playmaker's header was tipped over the crossbar by zitka. from petrov's resulting corner, hartson flicked on and chris sutton powered into space to head the ball past zitka and into the net.
three-goal lead miller had a chance to further increase the advantage just before half-time, but his shot was smothered by zitka at his near post. the three-goal cushion meant that the game was effectively decided at the interval, yet the visitors pushed forward in the opening exchanges of the second period. aruna dindane had a half-chance but bobo balde intervened before the ivory coast striker could shoot.
anderlecht on the attack however, despite their comfortable lead, the home side continued to press forward in search of more goals, and quickly threatened themselves as hartson tried to round off a swift counterattack, turning away from vincent kompany on the edge of the penalty area before shooting at zitka from 20 metres.
penalty drama however, the visitors were given a glimmer of hope 14 minutes from time as dindane went down under pressure from balde and the referee pointed to the spot. mornar's penalty was too close to magnus hedman and the swedish goalkeeper made the save, also blocking christian wilhelmsson's follow-up effort, but the ball bounced into the path of dindane and he scored high into the net from a tight angle.
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