Wasteful Celtic survived a late scare against 10-man Aberdeen to deliver Wilfried Nancy’s first win after five attempts.
It eases some pressure on the Frenchman who started his reign with four straight defeats, and keeps the gap to Premiership leaders Hearts at six points, with a game in hand.
Benjamin Nygren opened the scoring for the Hoops before the Dons, who were unbeaten in six league games, had Dylan Lobban sent off for hauling down Daizen Maeda.
The Hoops dominated possession but wasted chance after chance – finishing with a remarkable expected goals total of 4.53 – before Kenan Bilalovic slotted past Kasper Schmeichel to level late on.
But Kieran Tierney restored their lead with two minutes to go and James Forrest made sure of the win when he scored in a 17th consecutive season for Celtic in stoppage time.
Pressure eases, but Celtic leave it late
James Forrest has scored in 17 different seasons for Celtic
It was a positive end to a week where Peter Lawwell revealed he would be stepping down as chairman at the end of the year, citing “abuse” and “threats” amid ongoing protests by fans against the board.
Indeed, several thousand Celtic fans attended an anti-board protest outside the main stand before the game.
Nancy’s men took instant control and missed several chances amid a strange, subdued atmosphere.
In the seventh minute, Hoops striker Johnny Kenny missed a Maeda cross by inches before midfielder Arne Engels fired over from the edge of the box.
Maeda somehow fired wide of the target in the 27th minute from close range after Dimitar Mitov had spilled an Engels corner before the Dons ‘keeper saved Engels’ angled drive, and then Kenny missed the goal from 14 yards.
The first big cheer of the game came when Nygren slid in a cutback from Maeda and, as Celtic kept up their threat, Mitov tipped a drive from Luke McCowan over the bar.
Aberdeen’s Dylan Lobban (R) is shown a red card for a foul on Celtic’s Daizen Maeda
However, when Mitov’s sloppy pass, when he was well out of his box, went to Maeda, he raced towards goal and Lobban tugged him back, leaving referee David Dickinson will little option but to dismiss the defender.
Celtic’s pressure at the start of the second half was relentless.
Mitov made another two fine saves, first from an Auston Trusty header and then a McCowan drive.
The Dons ‘keeper was beaten by a chip from Nygren from a tight angle but the ball hit the far post and bounced back into his arms.
Kieran Tierney (L) restored Celtic’s lead late on
Mitov made yet another impressive save from Celtic defender Anthony Ralston’s long-range piledriver before Engels’ looping cross from the left hit the goal frame and the Granite City side again escaped, as they did when Engels crashed a header off the post.
Aberdeen’s leveller was against the run of play.
Substitute Kjartan Kjartansson sent 20-year-old Bilalovic racing through the middle and he beat Hoops ‘keeper Schmeichel with a drive.
Nerves jangled among the disbelieving home fans, but with three minutes remaining Tierney popped up at the back post to convert a cross from substitute Colby Donovan before fellow substitute Forrest slid in a third from close range.
Nancy: ‘This is just the beginning’
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Celtic boss Wilfried Nancy reacts to his first win in charge after four straight losses
Celtic manager Wilfried Nancy speaking to Sky Sports News:
“I feel good for the players. I think we deserved more wins, but it didn’t happen.
“You can see that today we hit the post five times. I’ve never seen that in my life, but this is something that we have to accept.
“That’s why I really like the resilience of my team, because to have many chances to score and to hit the post like this five times, and after that to concede a goal for 1-1 was not easy mentally, but they showed a lot of grit to be able to come back and to score two more goals.
“This is only the beginning. We have many things to work on, but today was a good day for them to express themselves and they did it well.
“I don’t chase anybody. We chase our performance, we chase ourselves, the way we have to play to compete with ourselves.
“And after that, the standing, we’re going to look at it a little bit later.
“For the moment, this is what we can do now. Improve, get better and, after that, we’ll see the standing.”
Thelin: ‘A fair result, but the point was there’
Jimmy Thelin (R) with Dylan Lobban (L), who was sent off against Celtic
Aberdeen boss Jimmy Thelin on Sky Sports News:
“Football can be strange sometimes.
“I think the way we started the game was not what we expected from ourselves. We can do better in the way we press or how we approach the game when we have the ball.
“Celtic were on top of us from minute one and then in the second half when we were one man down, of course the first 10-12 minutes we were a bit lucky.
“Sometimes you need some luck to get something from it, but then after that we go into the game and the players who come in on the pitch make an impact and we get to 1-1.
“Of course we need to use that because of the luck we had and the fighting spirit inside the team. The point was there to take in the end. That of course was disappointing.
“It’s a fair result, of course, they were better than us today.
“But also sometimes when you have this moment to grab a point, we have to take one more step and understand the situation we are in and play a little bit more mature in this moment and make the easy things more correct, the basic parts in the end of the game.”
