Scottish Premiership winners Celtic beat the champions of Sweden AIK Stockholm with James Forrest and Odsonne Edouard scoring Europa League goals.
AIK Stockholm deserved to lose against Celtic on Thursday night, a gracious Rikard Norling admitted to Fotboll Skanalen, after goals from James Forrest and Odsonne Edouard decided a first-leg clash in Glasgow.
Neil Lennon’s Hoops went some way to exercising the demons of that humiliating defeat to Cluj last week with an impressive performance and an even better result against the reigning champions of Sweden at Parkhead.
Forrest scored yet another crucial goal in Celtic colours just after half time before Edouard sealed a 2-0 win with a swerving rocket of a free-kick that Cristiano Ronaldo would have been proud to add to his scrapbook.
And AIK coach Norling admitted that his side were simply second best throughout.
“We played against a good team that deserved to win,” he said, while praising the speed of Celtic’s attack. “I think we handled it completely okay in the first half, but in the second half we let in a goal, which was tough and then they scored with a free kick.”
“They deserved to win because they were the better team after halftime.”
Celtic are now just 90 minutes away from reaching the group stages of the Europa League. But the biggest plus for Lennon will be a clean sheet in a testing encounter, just nine days after they gifted Cluj four goals to bring an end to their short-lived Champions League campaign.
Kristoffer Ajer shone at right-back while Jozo Simunovic looked solid alongside new £7 million centre-half Christopher Jullien. Even Boli Bolingoli-Mbombo, despite a few heart-attack inducing moments, looked more reliable and confident than ever before in Celtic colours.
A night full of positives for The Hoops, one week after their world fell apart.
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