Brendan Rodgers won’t ‘sit back and camp’ against big teams despite Celtic’s Champions League defeat to Dortmund

Brendan Rodgers says Celtic will continue to try to “show their ability on the ball” against illustrious European opponents despite another humiliating night in the UEFA Champions League against Borussia Dortmund.

It was not the first time that Celtic had been guilty of capitulation in European football’s premier competition, as they have also suffered major defeats against the likes of Real Madrid, Paris Saint-Germain and Barcelona in recent years.

Rodgers was asked in an interview with TNT Sports after the game if he intends to adapt his attacking style of play against Europe’s elite going forward.

“We always have to adapt, but sometimes quality just trumps that,” Rodgers said.

“Are we going to sit and camp and wait and wait? No, we won’t do that.

“We play in a way that allows us to dominate internally. We know that sometimes it will be difficult to do this, but we still have to show our ability with the ball.

“Tonight we were nowhere near that level, we delivered that too easily. So we were punished for that.”

A frantic opening saw Daizen Maeda quickly equalize after an Emre Can penalty, only for Karim Adeyemi to put Dortmund back in front just two minutes later.

It was the first of three goals the striker scored in a brilliant first half, and the punishment kept coming as Serhou Guirassy scored a penalty before half-time.

Guirassy scored twice in the second half before Felix Nmecha completed the rout with an excellent strike to cap off a clinical display from the hosts.

“I don’t think I’ve been involved in a game where virtually every mistake we made was punished,” Rodgers said.

“This is the level. This is the highest level of modern football. We were punished for that.

“The early goals seemed to scare us a little and we didn’t play with the same confidence. They were playing at a high level.

“In the second half the guys showed a lot of spirit, we had more possession of the ball and took more risks to create, but in the end we were defeated by a much better team.”

On what went wrong with his approach to the game, Rodgers said: “We’ll assess it later. We wanted to put pressure on the game, but we wanted to be balanced, firm and compact.

“A lot of times we were out of position at the wrong time and weren’t in compact shape, and the best players punish you. This is something we will see in the next games.”

Former Celtic manager Neil Lennon was at Signal Iduna Park commentating on the match on TNT Sports.

He urged Rodgers to find a different way of playing against the biggest teams, with six league games still to play, including clashes with Atalanta, RB Leipzig and Aston Villa.

“They let the game get away from them. They were very passive. They didn’t do the dirty parts of the game well enough, they weren’t physical enough. Very good,” said Lennon.

“They didn’t turn Dortmund around and continued to play the same way. The result was the same: own goal, own goal, own goal.

“Celtic did what they wanted constantly. This is the Champions League, it’s football at the highest level and it’s ruthless at times.

“Celtic were exposed tonight. There’s still a lot of mileage left in this group, but they have to analyze it and say: ‘We can’t do this away from home against top teams. Sometimes we have to find another way to play.’ It’s okay to play good football, but play it in the right areas.”

Celtic captain Callum McGregor lamented the brutally clinical finishing from Dortmund’s forwards, who produced some sensational finishes to capitalize on Bhoys’ mistakes.

“It’s painful. Every mistake we made, we were punished. This doesn’t happen that often. Before we knew it, we were 5-1 down. It’s a worrying night,” said McGregor.

“The second goal shook us, the stadium started working and before you knew it you were spinning. This is something we have to learn from.

“Normally we’re good at this kind of thing where we execute the game plan the way we’re supposed to. But we have to raise our hands.

“We didn’t do enough tonight. We found a good team, but we have to stick together. We had a good start to the season, we still got three points. If we’re realistic, we’ll be where we thought we would be after two games.”

The result took the breath away from Celtic after their impressive 5-1 victory over Slovan Bratislava in the first round in Glasgow.

Rodgers’ side travel to Europa League champions Atalanta on October 23 before facing Leipzig, Club Brugge, Dinamo Zagreb, Young Boys and Aston Villa.