Harry Kane's eyebrow-raising Celtic claim as one Hoops star stops Bayern from running wild in Champions League
The Bayern talisman has some interesting observations on Champions League battle with Celtic.
Bayern Munich star Harry Kane has made an eyebrow-raising claim when it comes to his side’s fortunes against Celtic - insisting one star stopped it from being a pounding.
The German giants were expected to roll over the Hoops on their own turf after a knockout round play-off first leg win by a 2-1 margin at Parkhead. Yes, it was Celtic who passed up chance after chance in the first half and were ahead right into second half stoppage time through a Nicolas Kuhn goal.
It was a match that looked bound for extra time with Celtic putting in a heroic effort to that point to get the game level on aggregate. Alphonso Davies then popped up in second half stoppage time to spare Bayern blushes.
Despite a Celtic performance where the Hoops shone and the Bundesliga side floundered, England striker Kane insists it was Kasper Schmeichel in the away net keeping the scoring down. With a tough game vs Bayer Leverkusen sandwiched between the two Celtic clashes, Kane is impressed by how his teammates have coped.
He told Bild: "I hope we can improve, both with and without the ball. With the ball it was a bit too sloppy, too many mistakes, and we were punished for that. And without the ball the intensity and counter-pressing decreased a bit. It's not that we don't want to. It's sometimes a mix of different things, we have to find the right solutions quickly. We now have two important games in the league and we will analyse it carefully.
“Football is not just a beautiful rainbow! We had to find a way to get through it. We know that we were not at our best level and can play better than in the last two games.
“We knew it would be tough, we knew they were coming here and trying to make life difficult for us. But I thought we played much better, we created a few chances, it was one of those days where their goalkeeper had a very good day, we had to be patient.
“Of course we would have preferred to have had a bit more peace of mind and win 2-0 or 3-0. But sometimes you just have to get through it somehow and that's what we did today. When you have three games in six days, against good opponents, two of them away, it's a burden that takes its toll."