CELTIC manager Ange Postecoglou has taken issue with Aberdeen counterpart Jim Goodwin for lumping his team in with Rangers, and can’t understand why the two Glasgow clubs are widely referred to as if they are one entity in the broader Scottish game.

Pittodrie boss Goodwin has defended the ultra-defensive tactics he employed against Celtic at the weekend by citing the 4-1 defeat his team suffered against Rangers at Ibrox earlier this season, where he adopted a more attacking formation that left his side open at the back.

Postecoglou says he has no problem with Goodwin setting out his team in such a fashion when playing Celtic, but he just wishes that opposition coaches, players and the press would stop discussing his club and city rivals Rangers as if they were one and the same.

“That’s the beauty of the game,” Postecoglou said. “You can play it in different ways.

“I have no issue with Jim setting up his team the way he did because he thought that was the best way for him to get a result. I’m hoping he analysed us, and he thought this was the best outcome. “The issue I had was that his reference point was that he said his tactics against Rangers didn’t work. What’s it got to do with us?

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“I have no issue with that kind of approach to getting a result. Every manager has to put out his team in a way he thinks best to get a result. What I do have an issue with is this generic analysis that we have.

“When I hear opposition managers and players talking about ourselves and Rangers as if we are one entity, that when you play the top two, this is what happens. I don’t understand it.

“We are totally different teams. We have different set-ups, different types of players, different strengths. Having one as a reference point for the other, that’s the bit I don’t get.

“Even the press ask questions in that manner. It just bemuses me. The reality of it is that, yes, they are playing defensively, but they have different ways of doing it. Callum Davidson does it differently at St Johnstone than David Martindale does at Livingston. 

“Even playing home and away, it is different. So even if we think a team will play defensively, we still look at that team and say ‘ok, where are the potential areas we can exploit? Where can they cause us problems?’ But a lot of it is really generic.

“We are selling the football public short because there should be nuances in there. There are differences in there. It is a little bit lazy when people just refer to teams as a group rather than individual entities.”

Meanwhile, Postecoglou has revealed that speculation over the future of Josip Juranovic after his impressive displays at the World Cup is just that, with no other clubs in contact with Celtic about the Croatian right-back.

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“There’s nothing,” he said. “If there is one thing about speculation, the realism is what you have to deal with. 

“We haven’t had any bids, we haven’t had any discussions. So, for me to start thinking about that is to leave reality and work in a space where speculation or conjecture is going to charter my day and I just don’t work that way.

“As we speak sight now, we haven’t had offers for any of our players. No-one is coming to see me and demanding to leave.

“All those kind of things…if and when something transpired, I will deal with them, but right now, there is nothing to deal with.”