This week we as a support, can tend to overlook our trip to St Johnstone, as instead we look towards our far more attractive match against Borussia Dortmund…
It’s entirely understandable, after the brilliant start we made in our opening Champions League game, and how our team is currently playing. Yet we can’t allow ourselves to take the eye off winning a “Proper 55” title either.
We are going to have to deal with a fixture schedule that is far from ideal, for such a testing challenge, probably our toughest match of the eight we will play in the group stage of the Champions League this season.
Playing on Saturday evening against St Johnstone, followed by a recovery day on Sunday, then possibly light training Monday, before a plane trip to Germany, for a match against last season’s Champions League finalists Dortmund on Tuesday night.
When you take into account that Dortmund, will be playing on Friday night, hence plenty of preparation time for themselves, it makes the Celtic task even tougher and it raises the question, as to just how much do the Scottish FA consider the coefficient points, at stake within European football.
I would also question the Celtic board as to why such a fixture schedule is allowed to be put in place, just to accommodate Premium Sports. Did they flag up any objections to this? Could Premier Sport not have shown this match on Friday evening?
We have seen the effect of playing high intensity football, which is a feature of our game this season, had upon both Callum McGregor and Reo Hatate against Falkirk on Sunday afternoon.
Sports science is having a far bigger impact upon decisions that Rodgers as manager will have make, especially throughout the course of our CL campaign. We are only too well aware of just how little protection our players will receive from match officials within Scottish football also.
So many factors, our club is going to have to overcome, before we even reach kick-off time in Dortmund. Unfortunately these are going to start becoming bigger issues that we will have to start finding solutions to, going forward.
The simplest and most convenient, would be for Celtic to have been playing St Johnstone on Friday night, in the same time-slot that Dortmund have been given by the Bundesliga. Surely our board has to start making a stronger case for ourselves, especially within scheduling of matches with a CL campaign in mind.
Maybe Friday night football can start to be introduced into the SPFL in order to give Scottish teams more preparation time for European matches, when required.
We might not have a lucrative TV deal in place within Scottish football, yet don’t believe the pittance of such a TV deal, should be allowed to affect potential European success and coefficient points for Scottish teams and remember the Celtic win last week saw a windfall for other Scottish sides.
If the Bundesliga can adjust fixture schedules to suit their teams playing in the Champions League then so should the SPFL. And as far as St Johnstone is concerned, they’d probably get the same or even more interest from their own fans in a Friday night game rather than on a Saturday at 5.45pm.
Celtic v Falkirk – Premier Sports Cup – Quarter-Final – Yang, Nicolas Kuhn and Paulo Bernardo after the Premier Sports Cup, quarter-final match at Celtic Park on Sunday September 22, 2024. Photo Andrew Milligan
Hopefully Brendan Rodgers can use the squad depth to his advantage and play as many players as possible who aren’t going to start in Dortmund. It’s a risk we are being forced to take through nothing more than poor planning. Not a mistake the Germans will make.
We know that Cameron Carter-Vickers and Alistair Johnston will sit this one out on Saturday, so Anthony Ralston and Auston Trusty will play. Greg Taylor and Liam Scales are likely to start to secure the back four playing in front of Kasper.
Callum McGregor is likely to start and Luke McCowan, cup-tied at the weekend, could get his first start for Celtic, with Reo Hatate being rested. Paulo Bernardo could make up the midfield three. Up top James Forrest and Yang could be on the wings with Adam Idah leading the line.
That would mean four of our likely starters in Dortmund all starting as Perth and hopefully none will play more than an hour.
COMING SOON ON CELTIC STAR BOOKS…CELTIC IN THE THIRTIES, VOL 1&2 BY MATT CORR…
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