The signs are good, good people. The signs are very good indeed. SNS were at Celtic’s training ground in Lennoxtown today and they snapped some rather uplifting pictures of Odsonne Edouard and Mohammed Elyounoussi back in training. Bolingoli was there too. Jonny Hayes has, of course, already been as good as passed fit and Olivier Ntcham may play tomorrow.
All of this is fine, fine news for us.
Most notable, of course, are those first two names; if we can get our two prodigious frontline talents back in this team we’re in business. Now it looks as if they will be there.
The hype surrounding this Sevco team right now is almost unbelievable except that we’ve all seen and heard it before.
Is the media really ignorant of the fact that our record matches theirs in domestic football this season, that we’ve already beaten them on their home turf and that in Europe we’ve already qualified, top of our group?
All the media focus is on them, on how ready they are, on how up for it they are, on how this is their big moment.
Celtic’s players and manager, who are more focussed on Hamilton than they are on the more distant horizons of the weekend, must be loving it.
Not one bit of pressure has been heaped on their shoulders although that will ramp up later in the week.
But Celtic has three players who have already scored double figures this season; Christie, Edouard and Forrest.
Elyounoussi has seven, McGregor has five and Ollie has four.
Even Scott Brown has weighed in with two, the same number as Rogic who’s been injured for months and has only played nine games.
There are goals galore in this side … we fear nobody.
Other clubs should fear us though, and one club in particular.
What the media fails to report, as usual, is that for all they hyped our “over dependence” on Odsonne Edouard – how’s that been working out for them these past few weeks? – over in Sevconia the vast majority of their goals have come from just two players, Morelos and Defoe … and they only ever play one of them at a time.
Celtic looks as if it will have all three of its top scorers on the park.
Should we need to change the game, furthermore, you can see that we have options for doing just that.
We have too many good players for them all to start; Rogic, Ntcham, Elyounoussi, Griffiths, Mikey Johnson … some of the game, perhaps all of them, will be subs and that gives us plenty of firepower in reserve should it be required.
Overall, there’s no reason for us not to feel confident … and plenty of reason for our opponents to be afraid.
All the news today is good.
If you haven’t done the Sevco liquidation quiz yet do it below … another quiz will be up during the week!
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