Celtic’s Third Choice Striker May Have No Option But To Carry This Team A While.

With it looking increasingly likely that we lose a cadre of our top players for a series of tough fixtures this month and next, the onus is on the players who will be left behind to get us over the line in those games.

One of them is Giorgios Giakoumakis.

The weight of this will rest heavily on his shoulders for a while.

He ought to be fit when we retake the field for the next game, and if he’s fit he better be sharp because after Hibs at home there is a very real likliehood that he’ll be holding the fort for a while.

We shouldn’t be letting this overly concern us.

Giakoumakis is a Greek international and Holland’s top scorer from last season. We’ve paid big money for this guy and if he’s not ready to take that step up then frankly he shouldn’t be at the club.

His pedigree suggests that he’s ready. It is high time he proved it.

He is going to need to, and in a very tough series of matches.

We face, in that timeframe, Hearts at Tynecastle, Dundee Utd at home and then the Ibrox lot roll into town.

It’s probably too early for the players, who will have to travel from the other side of the world, to be relied on for the game following that, against Motherwell, away on 6 February.

So that’s four big games in which Giakoumakis will, most probably, be the guy we’re most relying on to get the job done for us, and he simply cannot shirk that challenge.

He has to grab it with both hands because the likely shape of the Celtic team after those players return doesn’t leave a lot of room for him otherwise.

He has one shot to make himself indispensable, and he must already know it.