Up & Down At The Top Of The Scottish League

Hamilton Academical 1 Celtic 2

With a Rangers draw against Hibs, Celtic's 2-1 victory over the Accies on Sunday left the Bhoys a point clear at the top of the table.

For the first fifteen minutes of the game it was a different story with both sides looking out of sorts.

This changed when Shaun Maloney sissor-kicked a great cross from Andreas Hinkel into the net from six yards out. Advantage the visitors!

Hamilton responded well to the goal, applying pressure on the visitors' defence, Antoine-Curier almost getting an equalizer with a well-hit 30-yard shot that was saved by Lukasz Zaluska - who replaced the injured Artur Boruc between the posts.

Another drive from the home side saw Simon Mensing attempt to benefit from some dreadful Celtic defending, but his shot went over the bar.

Caldwell started another Celtic attack, his pass from midfield setting Aiden McGeady free, but Zheng Zhi was unable to direct his shot from McGeady's cross in.

In the 29th minute though, Celtic extended their lead to two, with a loose ball ending up with Scott McDonald, who breezed past three defenders and fired the ball into the net past Accies' keeper Tomas Cerny.

While Hamilton didn't let the scoreline slow them down, they were unable to take advantage of the chances they had.

This changed in the 83rd minute when McArthur was the first to a poor Caldwell clearance. His shot back into the box was flicked into the net by Antoine-Curier as Zaluska looked helplessly on.

The game was almost tied in the 88th minute when McArthur ended up in a one-on-one situation with Zaluska, but the Pole didn't lose his concentration and made a save to guarantee all three points for the visitors.

"We got the three points. The players were under a little bit more pressure than normal, but we're now top of the table and they showed some good character and resilience," said Celtic boss Tony Mowbray after the game.

"It's about picking up points. We got the points and a victory.

"The third goal in any game is crucial, and the bottom line was that we weren't really threatened too often.

"But that third goal gave them an ability to push on, and to be fair Lucas made a great save to prevent it going to 2-2.

"We would have been disappointed if we didn't take all three points today." Celtic were less fortunate on Thursday evening when they welcomed German outfit Hamburg SV to Parkhead in the Europa League.

Scott Brown and Shaun Maloney were wasteful in front of goal and Marcus Berg's second-half low strike into the net saw Celtic lose 1-0 and remain stuck at the bottom of Group C.

While the hopes of progressing to the next round of the Europa League are not completely lost, Celtic will have to up their game and win every game, while hoping that the other teams stumble, if they are to stand any chance at all of European football after Christmas.