How Celtic held Staggies at arm's length to bin 'potential banana skin'

Goals from Jota and Kyogo Furuhashi ensured the Hoops re-established their six-point gap at the summit after Rangers had temporarily cut it to three with a win against Motherwell at Fir Park a day prior.

The trip to the Highlands was viewed in some quarters as a potential banana skin match in the post-split fixtures - that wasn't quite the case in the end with Celtic good value for their win.

Ange Postecoglou made three changes from the Scottish Cup semi-final a week previous. Anthony Ralston, Matt O'Riley and Kyogo came in for Josip Juranovic, Tom Rogic and Liel Abada respectively.

Here, The Celtic Way highlights some of the key StatsBomb data from a crucial game in the title run-in to give you a match report experience like no other.

xG and trendline

Despite suggestions to the contrary, there was very little for Celtic to be nervy about throughout the match.

The Hoops created steadily all afternoon - even in the second half period when County had assumed some of the ascendancy - and ultimately racked up 2.91 cumulative xG to County's 0.48.

Statistically, Jota's goal was the best chance of the game with a 0.79 xG rating.

Based on the shots they manufactured, Celtic would have won this match 92 per cent of time.

Shots

Celtic's had 22 attempts at goal. Fourteen of their shots were in the box, with an overwhelming majority of those coming in close, central areas.

The breakdown of the 22 efforts was as follows: five were on target while 12 were off target and a further five blocked. In terms of xG, the Hoops created six mid-to-high-quality chances from open-play and scored from two of those.

Kyogo's 38th-minute 'sitter' was rated a 0.53 xG chance, which was good for the second-best of the game behind the Jota goal.

The Staggies managed six shots with their best opportunity Harry Paton's 56th-minute skied attempt.

Curiously, Celtic's second was marked as the first league goal this season to come from a throw-in - it is unclear what qualifies this chance but not, for instance, the Kyogo chest finish against Aberdeen in October.

In any case, individually speaking, Kyogo's five attempts were a game-high with Callum McGregor's three the next most.

Possession, passing and positions

Remember that the warmer the colour the more influential the player and the thicker the passing lines the more passes between the players. The network gives a sense of where the game was played and who was most involved.

What is most notable on this occasion is how 'bunched up' the Celtic average positions are towards the left flank. So much of County's play came down their right (see the below network) that this is not in itself a surprise but it did lead to Cameron Carter-Vickers adopting a deeper and slightly narrower average position than usual in response.

Indeed, the American also attempted only 49 open-play passes (for comparison, Carl Starfelt attempted 99). That difference was also reflected in the full-backs, with Taylor (71) out-passing Ralston (56) although both were more heavily involved than Carter-Vickers which is why his node is a cooler colour.

Again it is worth pointing out that the network gives almost a false reflection of the width in Celtic's attacking third due to the interchanging wing play and Jota's full switch to the left later in the game.

The Hoops completed 546 of 661 pass attempts for an 83 per cent success rate, a value that falls roughly in the middle of their past two league matches (74 per cent at Ibrox and 92 per cent against St Johnstone).

In terms of individual players, Jota clocked the most key passes with four followed by Taylor with two. The most common combinations were between Starfelt and Taylor as well as Starfelt and McGregor. Jota topped the xGChain while the most dangerous passing relationship in terms of xG was Ralston to O'Riley. Interestingly, Reo Hatate featured in four of the next five high-passing-xG combos.

Pressing and defending stats

As mentioned in the pass network section, the Celtic left flank saw the most action. This is somewhat reflected in their own pressing map pictured above but even more so in the County one (below).

Even so, Matt O'Riley (usually positioned to the right of attacking midfield) topped the Celtic pressing charts in raw numbers. Taylor took the mantle for total duration and duration per pressure but also pressured action fails. Staggies duo Ross Callachan and Jordan Tillson both topped 20 pressures.

O'Riley was top billing for counter-pressing too, with Taylor again the most 'persistent' in terms of duration.

Cameron Carter-Vickers' defensive actions map reinforces his slightly different average positioning v Ross County

When it came to defensive actions, Taylor (two tackles, four interceptions, two clearances) and Carter-Vickers (six interceptions, four clearances, five aerial wins) led the way with notable contributions also from McGregor (one tackle, four interceptions, two aerial wins) and Starfelt (four tackles, one interception, four clearances).