I have some wonderful news; Kelechi Iheanacho has remembered how to score goals. Quite a lot of them, actually.

The former Celtic striker has now scored in 11 consecutive games since moving to Turkey, which is a remarkable achievement by any standard. Good for him. Genuinely.

I liked Iheanacho when he was at Celtic. He scored important goals for us, helped us during an incredibly difficult period last season and played his part in getting us over the line when the title race had become completely ridiculous.

So, I am pleased that things are going well for him. Really, I am.

But here is the question I keep asking myself whenever his latest goal is reported as though it has some enormous significance for Celtic: why do we care?

I do not mean that nastily. I do not wish him any harm. Quite the opposite. But Kelechi Iheanacho is no longer a Celtic player.

He left the club in the summer. He now plays his football in Turkey, and if he scores in another 11 consecutive games I will still be happy for him.

What I will not do is suddenly start wondering whether Celtic made some terrible mistake by allowing him to leave. And I certainly will not start using his goals to attack Kasper Høgh as some folk online appear to want to.

Because this is where some of the discussion becomes slightly ridiculous.

I have already seen comparisons between Iheanacho’s goals and Høgh’s current struggles. Apparently, one striker is scoring and the other is not, therefore Celtic obviously kept the wrong one. Football analysis complete. Everyone may go home.

Except football does not work like that.

There are different types of striker. I appreciate that this may come as a shocking revelation to certain people, but not every footballer whose job description contains the word “striker” performs exactly the same function.

Kelechi Iheanacho and Kasper Høgh are not the same kind of player. They never have been.

Iheanacho has always been capable of playing off another striker, dropping into space, linking attacks and combining with players around him.

One of the best periods of his Leicester career came when he played alongside Jamie Vardy rather than simply replacing him. That partnership worked because they gave Leicester different things. Vardy stretched the defence while Iheanacho could drop away from it. One created space, the other could exploit it.

That is football. It is not particularly complicated.

Kasper Høgh is different. He is much more of a traditional penalty-box striker.

He wants to play off the shoulder. He wants the ball delivered into areas where he can attack it. He wants movement around him which creates space for him to make those runs. He wants crosses, cutbacks and chances.

And when Celtic signed him, that was exactly the player we were buying.

So, if Celtic do not create those conditions for him, what exactly are we judging?

You cannot buy a player because he is excellent at one particular style of football, then ask him to operate in another style entirely and become shocked when the results are different.

It would be like hiring a brilliant pastry chef and then complaining that he is not particularly good at fixing the boiler. Different job. Different skill set.

This is why the Iheanacho comparison irritates me.

Not because I dislike Iheanacho. I do not. Not because I think Høgh should be protected from criticism. He should not. He has not scored enough goals, and he knows that. We know that. Martin O’Neill knows that.

But if we are going to analyse why, then let us at least analyse the right things.

Is Høgh getting into good positions? Is Celtic getting the ball to him quickly enough? Are the wide players creating the kind of situations from which he scores? Is he making the runs? Is he finishing the chances when they arrive?

Those are useful questions. “Kelechi Iheanacho scored again in Turkey, therefore Kasper Høgh is rubbish” is not useful analysis.

It is barely analysis at all. In fact, I would go further. Sunday’s performance against Hearts demonstrated exactly why context matters.

Celtic suddenly had pace on both sides. Callum Osmand was attacking from the left. Haissem Hassan was attacking from the right. Players were moving off the ball. Defenders were being dragged out of position. Balls were going into dangerous areas.

The whole attack was moving at a speed we simply have not seen often enough.

Camilo Durán played through the middle and did brilliantly. But I also think Høgh would have enjoyed that first half enormously. Give a penalty-box striker that kind of movement around him and suddenly his job becomes much easier.

Instead, Høgh came on later, after the game had slowed down and after the two wide players who had caused most of the chaos had been removed. Even then, he still contributed to the seventh goal.

Footballers do not perform inside laboratory conditions. They are affected by the players around them, the system they play in and the service they receive. Iheanacho finding a system and environment which suits him in Turkey does not prove Celtic were wrong to move on. It proves that footballers can flourish when circumstances suit them.

What a discovery.

And perhaps instead of using every Iheanacho goal as another stick with which to beat Høgh, people might consider whether Celtic can create circumstances which suit the striker we actually have.

I hope Iheanacho keeps scoring. I hope he scores 20 more and has a wonderful season. He did good things for Celtic and deserves to be remembered fondly.

But he is gone. Kasper Høgh is here.

That is where my interest lies.

And if we want to judge Høgh fairly, then let us judge him as Kasper Høgh, not as some imaginary version of Kelechi Iheanacho wearing a different shirt. Because they are different footballers. They perform different roles and they need different things.

Anyone comparing them purely by looking at the latest goals column is not really comparing anything at all.

They are simply counting. My English-teacher verdict?

Lovely arithmetic. Needs considerable improvement in football comprehension.

Choose The CelticBlog as a ‘Preferred Source’ on Google News for quick access to the news you value.