{"id":365951,"date":"2026-01-12T10:30:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T10:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/365951\/"},"modified":"2026-01-12T10:30:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T10:30:11","slug":"dundee-united-ace-spots-biggest-celtic-difference-under-martin-oneill-after-putting-wilfried-nancy-to-the-sword","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/365951\/","title":{"rendered":"Dundee United ace spots biggest Celtic difference under Martin O’Neill after putting Wilfried Nancy to the sword"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jom Goodwin’s men clobbered Celts at Tannadice last month but it was a different story in Glasgow at the weekend\"Sebastian<\/p>\n

Sebastian Tounekti in action(Image: SNS Group)<\/p>\n

Craig Sibbald admits Dundee United were up against a different Celtic animal under Martin O\u2019Neill.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Tannadice men put Celts to the sword on Tayside when Wilfried Nancy<\/a> was in charge last month. But the Hoops roared back with the Northern Irishman back at the helm<\/a> and Sibbald admitted the Parkhead side were an entirely new proposition.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cThey obviously changed back to what they kind of used to and it’s harder to get the press on in that shape. So they’re obviously more comfortable in it and it was harder for us to press them high up and make them go longer. So it was difficult to get to grips with.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was totally different. I think they’re confident in that formation they play and they’re kind of back to their usual selves.<\/p>\n

“I sensed that the fans were behind them from the start and they were dangerous from the start and they created a lot of chances. But a bit of slack defending from us, dropping runners, and after no time they were 2-0 up, so it was a hard day at the office.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s not going to define our season, but we need to get back to winning ways. Bad day for us, but onto the next one.\u201d<\/p>\n

Celtic<\/a> were slick but United were under par and Sibbald wants an immediate response in Saturday\u2019s Scottish Cup clash with Ayr.<\/p>\n

The playmaker was in the Falkirk side that went down to Inverness Caley Thistle at Hampden in 2015 and is desperate for another crack at silverware after watching the recent success at Aberdeen and St Mirren.<\/p>\n

Sibbald said: \u201cYou can’t beat a cup run, so we’ll be looking to try and do that ourselves and see where it can take us. I’ve obviously been to a final before in 2015 and I want to try and correct that, so that’s what I’ll be looking to do next week.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou want to try and do well in those competitions. You can’t beat the occasion, so we’ll be looking to go into that next week and get the win and do the job.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’ve got to get back to winning ways and try and aim for that top six. I think that’s our goal all season and we’re not far away from it. The gaffer was saying we’re kind of five points off where we were last year, so if we can win a few more games in this winter period, we’ll be doing all right and back on track.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sibbald was gutted at the Hoops defeat but it was another impressive individual performance in a solid season so far.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cObviously apart from the result, I’m playing a lot more and I’m fit and getting a lot of game time. So I’m enjoying being back out there.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m always going to work hard for the team and try and get us playing on the ball and that. So I’m just trying to do my job for the team and get us back to winning ways next week.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jom Goodwin’s men clobbered Celts at Tannadice last month but it was a different story in Glasgow at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":365952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[2817,13716,218,30905,101,56,54,55,12432],"class_list":{"0":"post-365951","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-celtic-fc","9":"tag-dundee-united-fc","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-martin-oneill","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom","15":"tag-unitedkingdom","16":"tag-william-hill-scottish-cup"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=365951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=365951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=365951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=365951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}