Celtic star Sebastian Tounekti may be becoming too easy a target amid a disappointing run of form. The winger has struggled with his final product during his time at the club, albeit he wasn't a regular feature last season.
The 24-year-old has played more often this season, helped by the absence of Jota until now, but also the absence of Yang Hyun-jun for pretty much all of September due tot he Asian Games.
The Celtic attack has been hot and cold as a collective, make no mistake, but Tounekti has undoubtedly had his struggles. For a player who clearly has technical ability, the Tunisia international has lacked confidence in the final third and struggled to provide regular service.
Scott Brown and Chris Sutton took swipes at Tounekti over the weekend after Callum Osmand impressed on the left, and now Charlie Mulgrew has joined in.
“The second half in Benfica, that front three were brilliant,” Mulgrew said on the Go Radio Football Show. “Osmand ran in behind, which Tounekti hadn’t done the whole first half. Hassan takes the ball in the first 20 minutes and gets a couple of crosses into the box and a couple of attempts at goal, and all of a sudden things look a bit brighter.
“He gets an assist, and then you think – I said it before the game – why is Tounekti playing? I continuously see Tounekti starting games for Celtic, and wonder why. I don’t think he offers anywhere near enough.
“He must be doing something in training, and Hassan must be walking about in training. Martin O’Neill sees them every day in training, but I can only see Hassan as somebody that can create and produce something.
“I still think he needs to improve his final ball, but at least he has a go, and at least Osmond runs in behind. At least there’s some sort of spark.
“Tounekti receives the ball, checks back and goes backwards every time, and it’s not even to take the ball on to his other foot and cross it. You need to do something as a winger, you need to go and create, that’s your job.”
Tounekti criticism is bordering on inaccurate
Mulgrew's comments are relatively fair. It's true that the winger needs to show more confidence, look to beat that final man and get a quality ball in the box or unleash a quality shot. He isn't doing that often enough.
But there has been criticism out there suggesting the winger has nothing to offer, and that's just not true. It's no different to Kasper Hogh, whose performances have been rotten but it's simply put down to a lack of confidence.
Tounekti should get that same grace, and we can assume there needs to be an injection of confidence and more of a licence for him to go at players and make mistakes.
He has ability and shows it with his pace and trickery, but he is shying away from showing it in the final third, which is obviously a problem. But at 24 years of age, that can be tweaked, and O'Neill's job is to find a way to get that out of the winger. And who knows? The increased competition on the left might bring that out of him.
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