Brown slams Killie’s roughhouse tactics

CELTIC midfielder Scott Brown claims Shunsuke Nakamura was subjected to some “ridiculous” challenges by Kilmarnock players before having to go off injured in the Co-operative Insurance Cup tie.

Nakamura scored his side’s second goal on Wednesday night with a trademark free-kick — his seventh in total against the Ayrshire side — minutes before he was booked by referee Craig Thomson for pointing out to the official that he had been on the wrong end of four tough tackles.

The 30-year-old midfielder remained in the dressing room at the interval nursing a bruised thigh as the Scottish champion booked their semi-final place with a 3-1 win.

Killie manager Jim Jefferies later rubbished suggestions from the Celtic camp that his side had been overly physical.

However, Brown understands why the normally-placid Nakamura, who will be fit for tomorrow’s Clydesdale Bank Premier League trip to Hearts, reacted in the way he did.

The Scotland midfielder, who picked up his October player-of-the-month award at the club’s Lennoxtown training complex yesterday, said: “I think there were some ridiculous challenges during the week.

“I don’t know how Naka got booked but he did.

“If you see the goals he has scored against Kilmarnock, you can understand why (they targeted him) — he’s scored about seven free-kicks in the last three years.

“And you can understand why he reacted. The ball was nowhere to be seen and the player came though the back of him and the referee hasn’t really seen it and neither has the linesman, so you can understand it.

Manager Gordon Strachan, who was at great pains to stress he did not raise the subject of Nakamura’s treatment and was merely responding to questions from the media, expanded the issue into a general theme of referees and the protection of ball players.

He said: “I say to our smaller type of footballers, our tricky players, that they have to accept knocks as part of the job and to get up and get on with it. That’s what I ask from them.

“I’m just talking about players in general, (Aiden) McGeady, (Shaun) Maloney, (Scott) McDonald and the young boys coming through.

“I don’t ask them to go crashing in to tackles, I ask them to get there quickly and try to annoy people and intercept the ball.

“If they get a knock and it’s fair then they accept it. I ask them to be brave and to take the ball and they did that the other night.

“But I think that if you get hit, and it’s not fair, then it’s up to other people to protect them.”