Celtic’s range of tactical options presents the manager with a real dilemma.

All of us have looked at scenarios Celtic might use in the coming season. All of us have played around with possible team shapes and systems, and there are several which are perfectly viable.

Martin O’Neill has spoken about wanting to see Celtic play with two strikers, and I can understand exactly where he is coming from. At various stages of his managerial career, Martin has operated successfully with two central front men.

But any decision to play two strikers creates difficult choices somewhere else on the pitch.

This is simply the natural consequence of having good players in your squad. If you have enough of them, there will never be enough places for everybody to start every week. Depending on the system, you may have three or four very good footballers sitting on the bench, and there is nothing inherently wrong with that.

We call it squad depth. It is what every serious club strives for before the season reaches the point where you are playing three matches a week and suddenly discover why you needed all those players in the first place.

But the dilemmas it creates are very real.

Celtic have gone out and signed an attacking winger. Everyone wanted us to sign one. We needed greater threat on the right-hand side of the pitch, and Haissem Hassan is an exciting and necessary addition.

But once you accept that the signing is both good and necessary, you immediately have to ask who drops out. Sebastian Tounekti played extremely well yesterday.

But somebody else played extremely well too. As I said in the piece I wrote immediately after the game, Benjamin Nygren was brilliant.

And Martin is now approaching what I would call the sexiest dilemma in football: whatever system he chooses and whatever team he picks, some very good footballers are not going to get onto the pitch.

For a while now we have been wondering what a Celtic system with two strikers might actually look like. Yesterday made the question even more interesting.

Take a straightforward 4-4-2.

You have two central midfielders, two wide players and two strikers.

Callum McGregor is not getting dropped, so that immediately leaves one central midfield position for the players Celtic currently have, including Mika Baur, whom we have just signed from Germany.

But we are supposedly looking for at least one more central midfielder.

So, let’s assume Celtic sign one. It does not matter which of the names currently circulating in the media eventually walks through the door. If that player partners Callum McGregor, where do Baur and the new guy fit?

More importantly, where do you play Benjamin Nygren?

You could put Benji on the left and Hassan on the right. That is perfectly workable, although Nygren is not a natural winger.

But football is increasingly about roles rather than simply positions on a formation graphic. You could use Nygren as a playmaking wide midfielder, allowing him to drift centrally and attack the spaces where he is most dangerous.

I think he would still score goals and create chances from there.

Even then, however, you are leaving out Tounekti. You are leaving out Yang.

Right now that might not look like a deal-breaker to everybody, but Yang has probably been the most improved footballer at Celtic over the last couple of seasons. I once thought there was very little there. Last season he demonstrated that there absolutely is.

Tounekti, meanwhile, has produced two excellent performances already this season and might just be turning a corner.

I still think Celtic need a permanent solution on the left-hand side. But sign that player as well and Martin’s selection dilemma becomes even greater.

Then there is the 3-5-2.

Now that is a distinct possibility.

At the moment we do not have Alistair Johnston, and Kieran Tierney has been perfectly capable of playing central defence in the past. You lose some of Tierney’s attacking threat by using him there, which matters because of how productive he can be going forward, but it is hardly impossible to imagine.

The question domestically is whether Celtic really need three central defenders against most Scottish opposition.

The advantage is what it gives you elsewhere.

You retain a midfield three. You can play two strikers. You still have width provided by the wing-backs. And because one of those midfielders can be highly attacking, suddenly Benjamin Nygren is right back in his ideal area.

Nygren increasingly reminds me of Tom Rogic in one important respect. He looks like a player who is naturally suited to a particular role and particular spaces on the pitch.

He can play elsewhere. That gives him useful versatility. But his best work clearly comes when he is operating as that attacking midfielder behind the forwards, arriving in dangerous positions, creating chances and scoring goals.

He has already demonstrated how effective he can be there.

In a 3-5-2, your deeper midfield pair could then be McGregor and one other.

That allows Martin to rotate Baur and whoever else comes in depending on the opposition. In Europe, if greater solidity is required, Nygren can move wide, drop deeper or even come out of the starting line-up altogether so Celtic can play a more robust midfield three.

That kind of flexibility is exactly why the 3-5-2, which Martin used extensively during his first spell at Celtic, is worth considering again.

The 5-3-2 seems less likely domestically but is not impossible in Europe.

You need players in the wide positions who have genuine defensive qualities, which immediately makes Kieran Tierney and a fit Alistair Johnston obvious candidates. The problem is that you then lose Hassan from the starting line-up and sacrifice much of the attacking width supplied by natural wingers.

You get your midfield three back. You can still use Nygren there if you want him. You retain two central strikers. But Celtic are not going to spend every Saturday afternoon in Scotland playing with five defenders. I cannot imagine that in a million years.

In Europe, however? Absolutely. Against certain opposition it could make excellent sens when you are visiting those tough away grounds.

Then there is a 4-3-1-2.

That one fascinates me. You retain your back four and play three central midfielders as a block, with Nygren operating behind two strikers.

You sacrifice natural attacking width, but the full-backs are then encouraged to get high up the pitch whenever circumstances allow.

In possession it can become a very aggressive system.

You have Tierney and the right-back supplying crosses into the penalty area for two central strikers, with Nygren arriving behind them. Of the midfield three, one player remains deeper as the anchor and provides some protection against counter-attacks.

I can absolutely see the attraction.

But once again there is a cost. Hassan does not start. Tounekti does not start. Yang does not start. That is the dilemma.

And the beautiful thing about all of these formations is that none of them has to remain fixed for ninety minutes. Celtic could start in a 3-5-2 and move towards a 5-3-2 when protecting a lead. With one straightforward substitution, the same shape could become a 4-4-2. If Tierney starts as one of the three central defenders, move him across to left-back, introduce a natural right-back and suddenly your entire defensive structure changes.

Camilo Durán creates even more possibilities because of his versatility.

He can start as the second striker and move wide during the match, allowing Celtic to switch to one central forward without replacing him. That means the formation itself can change while many of the same players remain on the pitch.

And here is the really interesting part.

None of these formations is a stretch. Celtic have, or are very close to having, the personnel required to play any of them when everyone is fit.

More importantly, they could conceivably play several of them during the course of a single match. That is where Martin’s comments about two strikers become especially interesting. Wanting to play two up front does not mean Celtic have to start every match that way.

It does not mean they have to finish every match that way either.

They can chop and change. They can mix it up.

We may be approaching the kind of squad depth where Celtic can alter the entire formation in-game to exploit what is happening in front of them. If the opposition is sitting deep, add attacking players. If we need greater midfield control, change the shape.

If we are protecting a European lead, strengthen the defensive structure. If we need a goal, push Durán centrally beside Høgh and put Hassan high and wide. This might be the most exciting thing about where Celtic are right now.

Martin O’Neill is talking like a manager who has more than one idea about how he wants his team to play. We do not appear to be wedded to a single formation.

We are wedded to an attacking philosophy and to moving the football forward at greater speed, but every one of these systems can accommodate that.

And that is where yesterday’s performances have made things even more interesting. A couple of players presented Martin with a dilemma which I’m sure he already knew was coming.

Nygren is increasingly making himself impossible to ignore. Tounekti has now produced consecutive performances which demand attention. Hassan has arrived expecting to play. Baur has just joined and another midfielder may still be coming. Høgh is the central striker. Durán looks far too dangerous simply to leave sitting on the bench.

Martin has to solve that. And I don’t know what his answer will be.

Neither does anybody else.

Nobody yet knows what this Celtic squad will look like when the rebuild is complete, how many different options the manager will have or how many different positions some of these players will ultimately occupy.

But the days when opponents could confidently predict the Celtic line-up and formation may be disappearing. That is an extremely exciting prospect for us.

It should be a worrying one for everybody else.

Because Celtic were winning matches with enough frequency to dominate Scottish football even when opponents generally knew exactly how we were going to line up and what we were going to try to do.

Now change the system. Then change it again. Make opponents prepare for two strikers and start with one. Make them prepare for wingers and overload the centre. Make them adjust during the game and then use the bench to counter their adjustment.

Suddenly Celtic are no longer predictable.

And if opponents cannot know how we will line up, what formation we will use or how that formation might change after twenty minutes, they cannot fully prepare to counter us before the match starts.

If Martin then has enough quality sitting on the bench to respond to whatever they do next, this stops being simply a question of squad depth.

It becomes tactical power.

And if that is where this rebuild is heading, we are going to have a lot of fun this season.

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