GLASGOW (AFP) - After watching his Celtic side struggle to a 1-0 victory at home to Kilmarnock on Saturday Gordon Strachan admitted his side cannot afford to drop points if they are to win their third Scottish Premier League title in a row.

The Parkhead side went into Saturday's match trailing league leaders Rangers by four points.

Despite dominating proceedings, with more than an hour played Celtic had still not found a way past the Kilmarnock's goalkeeper Alan Combe and the nerves among the home side's fans, making up the majority of the 56,618 crowd, were tangible.

However, an own goal from Martyn Corrigan in the 64th minute - when he diverted Scott Brown's shot into his own net - handed Celtic victory and took them to within a point of their Old Firm rivals ahead of their game away to Inverness Caledonian Thistle on Sunday.

Although Strachan claimed he was happy with his side's performance he admitted there was little room for error from now until the end of the season if they are to pip Rangers to the SPL trophy.

The Celtic manager said: "If you are going for the championship, as I think we are, then it's hard to drop points. As a manager you ask your team to do certain things and I wasn't disappointed by anyone on Saturday.

"My style at Celtic so far has been a championship winning style and I want to continue that. Against Kilmarnock the guys showed great determination, focus and mental strength.

"Scott McDonald was fantastic without scoring a goal, Massimo Donati was fantastic, Shunsuke Nakamura showed some great touches, Scott Brown was driving forward from midfield, we never looked in doubt at the back.

"I liked our performance today, I liked it a lot, and on a good day we would have scored."

With Celtic already missing full-backs Mark Wilson and Cameroon's Jean-Joel Perrier Doumbe to long-term injuries they suffered another blow on Saturday when new signing Andreas Hinkel hobbled off with a thigh strain early in the first half.

The German defender, who was making his SPL debut, joined Dutch international striker Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink on the Celtic Park treatment room after he suffered a deep cut on his forehead after a clash of heads with Killie defender Simon Ford.

Strachan said: "Andreas had a virus on Friday but he wanted to play. Sometimes when your body is tired you tend to get these things but hopefully it's not a bad one.

"Jan got a bad one. He lost a lot of blood and needed five stitches. I've seen bigger cuts but he burst a blood vessel which made it worse."

The two injuries meant New Zealand striker Chris Killen and Derek Riordan were brought off the substitute's bench in the 18th minute and Strachan was happy with both, along with midfielder Paul Hartley who moved back to right back.

And the Celtic manager also revealed the forced changes show why he is determined to hold onto all his fringe players until the end of the season.

Strachan said: "We lost two top players early on but we adjusted and it didn't affect us too much. Hartley moved back to right back and showed a lot of heart and is prepared to play anywhere. Killen showed some good touches, although he was rusty at times as he's not played many games but he's a good teammate.

"Riordan played well too, although he's a wee bit rusty and one or two things went askew but that's not a problem. As I've said before I'm not interested in weakening my squad in January so I don't want anyone to leave."