Celtic manager Ange Postecoglou says Greg Taylor can go from strength to strength

Celtic full-back Greg Taylor earned the praise of his manager as he marked his 100th appearance for the club with a goal and an assist.

Taylor set up Kyogo Furuhashi for the opener in the 3-0 win over Livingston, then netted a powerful long-range striker himself before Jota wrapped up the scoring at the Tony Macaroni Arena.

it was the second league game running where Taylor had found the net, having scored the winner in the 4-3 win over Hearts at Tynecastle.

Celtic boss Ange Postecoglou was delighted with the player’s contribution and said that his improvement was evident, with more to come.

“Yes, that’s great for him (Taylor) and like all our players he has improved a hell of a lot because he wants to improve,” Postecoglou said.

“I have tried to set up an environment where players can be the best they can be and constantly improve, but they have to embrace it and he certainly has.

“From the moment I arrived, he is one of the few who have stayed on and you can see he is growing all the time as a footballer.

“He got a great goal today and with the way we play with our full-backs we want them to be an attacking threat.

“I think he is growing into that aspect of it and his general play has been really strong all year. He is still relatively young and there is more to come.”

The manager felt his side had showed “strong mentality” in the win over a team he believes make it hard for their opposition, especially at home. He was also pleased to see a successful return for Jota, who has missed the last five games through injury.

“It is easy to forget he had a great start to the season, he was incredible for us,” Postecoglou said.

“For him to miss the last period, along with Callum (McGregor), it is disappointing for him more than anything else because he wanted to make an impact at Champions League level.

“He scored against Leipzig, he was looking good and he has worked hard in rehab.

“We still have four games to go before the break and again in the second half of the year I’m sure he will be back to his best and looking to improve because again, he is a young player as well.”

Livingston manager David Martindale said the result wqas a fair one but noted Celtic’s resources, which were on display when they introduced David Turnbull, Liel Abada, Jota, Giorgos Giakoumakis and Oliver Abildgaard as substitutes.

He said: “I turned round to Marvin Bartley and said, ‘look at their substitutions. It’s not bad’.

“But I still think we were very competitive with the XI we put out. We had eight missing but I don’t think that had anything to do with the game today.

“When you look at Celtic’s bench and the players they can bring on, I was a bit envious, I’m not going to lie. Financially they are miles ahead of us. But I felt we limited them to few chances.

“We didn’t deserve anything from the game, Celtic deserved the three points.

“Celtic are the team to beat this season, they’re a top team, so I knew it was going to be a difficult game.”