Sometimes you come up against a team who are just better than you, and Altrincham, four divisions higher than Celtic made that gulf show, barely putting a foot wrong all game.

Celtic’s best chance of the half came in the opening few minutes. A glorious pass from Joe Robbins was brought down with one touch by Darius Palma, with his other foot, he laid off Pawel Zuk, before receiving the ball back and firing low, with only a deflection between him and opening his account at Celtic. Altrincham put the game out of reach in a five-minute spell midway through the half. Angus Dior held off the challenges and pulled the ball back from the touchline to a waiting George Wilson who placed his shot beyond Luke Hewitson’s fingertips. It was two five minutes later as a corner came floating in, Matty Kosylo headed it back and Regan Linney applied the coup de grace with a low, powerful strike. Robbins did get a chance to pull one back for Celtic, firing in Darius Osei’s lay off, but too many bodies between him and goal saw the ball spin out for a corner.

In an arctic second half, Celtic could barely keep possession against their full-time opposition. However, Altrincham didn’t carve out a lot of chance of their own, with half chances flying wide. That changed in the last ten minutes when Kaiden Powell out-paced Cole Lonsdale dragging the Celtic defence to him. He passed and Dior Angus had an empty net to tap into. Not as empty as Altrincham’s final goal, when Max Leonard’s pass-back barely got five metres before Linney popped up, took the ball around Hewitson, and walked into the net.

Celtic didn’t play badly, but Altrincham are knocking on the door of League football this season and it showed