Dundee’s youngsters held unbeaten Development League champions Celtic to a draw at Links Park and came close to giving them their first league defeat of the season.
The Hoops applied the early pressure and Theo Archibald flicked the ball wide of the post in the fourth minute.
Kyle Gourlay in the Dundee goal then made a superb save from Calvin Miller to keep the scoresheet blank, but he was beaten in on 15 minutes when Mark Hill latched on to a great through ball from Joe Thomson to lob the Dens keeper.
Dundee suffered a blow when influential midfielder Jesse Curran had to limp off after 25 minutes, but, just a minute after coming on as a substitute John Black capitalised on a mix-up in the Celtic defence to level the scores.
A poor passback by Thomson was pounced on by BLACK who beat the keeper before slamming the ball into an empty net.
The visitors still held the upper hand and Greg Warwick had to put in a great tackle on the edge of his own box to prevent them from scoring.
Black almost did it again when another poor passback let him in but keeper Ross Doohan saved his effort.
As the first half ebbed away Gourlay pulled off another fine save to deny Archibald.
Dundee’s higher pressing as the game went on was forcing Celtic into mistakes at the back and another passback fell this time to Craig Wighton.
Wighton tried to find Black who was up with him, but his pass was too strong and the chance was lost.
Black and Kyle Clark both had efforts on target but the visitors went even closer when Dan Higgins headed wide when it looked easier to score.
A ball in behind the Dens defence looked troublesome but Kerr Waddell got back in time to clear the danger.
Josh Skelly came on for the hard working Taylor Berry with 15 minutes to go but the home side fell behind three minutes later.
Miller made tracks down the left and found Regan Hendry whose shot deflected off a Dens defender to give Gourlay no chance.
It was cruel on a battling Dundee side but they raced upfield and Wighton was unfortunate to see his shot come back off the post.
But the Dens Parkers’ persistence was rewarded and, remarkably, their second equaliser came courtesy of the other substitute, SKELLY, who slotted the ball into the bottom corner after good work by Clark and Wighton.
It was end to end stuff at this stage and Ryan Gemmell looked to have won it for Dundee with a terrific shot, but Doohan pulled off a great save. Then Celtic raced to the other end and only a superb block by Waddell prevented Thomson scoring.
Both sides had chances in the closing minutes and a draw was a fair result. The young Dark Blues came as close as anyone this season to ending Celtic’s unbeaten league run.
FT: Dundee 2 Celtic 2
Dundee: Gourlay, Gibb, Warwick, Priest, Waddell, Curran (Black 25), Colquhoun, Clark, Berry (Skelly 74), Gemmell, Wighton.
Report: Jim Davie
