Winning Hayes

Jonny Hayes reflects on Celtic’s impressive start to 2019 and his desire to help the team under any circumstance.

- Joe Donnelly

CELTIC’S blistering run of domestic form continued on Sunday, when a dramatic 1-0 victory over Kilmarnock at Rugby Park established an eight-point gap between the Hoops and their closest competition at the top of the SPFL table.

Scott Brown’s decisive 90th-minute strike secured maximum points on the road for Brendan Rodgers’ side against an industrious, tightly-organised and well-disciplined Killie, with the win also extending the Scottish champions’ domestic winning run to eight out of eight in 2019, with 22 goals scored without reply.

Having slotted in at left-back in place of Emilio Izaguirre and the injured Kieran Tierney, the ever-versatile Jonny Hayes savoured the late drama in Ayrshire.

“In a strange way, a win like that is sweeter than a 4-0 or 5-0 win at home, in terms of the effort and hard work that goes into the game,” said Hayes in an exclusive interview with the Celtic View. “It was a tough game, and obviously the pitch isn’t great and Kilmarnock are a good and organised side.

“We said at half-time it might take until 88-90 minutes to win the game, and we had a game-plan, stuck to it, and it came up trumps for us.

“Away from home, you saw the backing we had from the off, two full stands, and for our captain and leader to go and seal the game in the 90th minute, it makes it that much sweeter. We worked hard, we had a game-plan against Kilmarnock that we’d worked on for a few days beforehand, and we stuck to it.

“Sometimes in situations when it isn’t necessarily going your way, it’s easy to think about doing your own thing, but then you remember why the manager is the manager. He has the final input and he knows what he’s doing more than any of us.