Brendan Rodgers thinks Celtic are earning more respect in Europe following comments from Atletico Madrid boss Diego Simeone.
The legendary coach spoke highly of Celtic and how the performances from the team are ‘better’ than the results suggested – he cited the last two performances.
The Bhoys are in Madrid ahead of tonight’s all-important Champions League tie against Atletico, Brendan Rodgers was asked about that and he added how he has been ‘very happy’ with the level of performances from the team, as he told his pre-match press conference.
The Northern Irishman did point out that ‘the cynics’ will state that Celtic only have one point to their name, but as mentioned, the team deserved much more.
The 2-2 draw against Atletico Madrid at Celtic Park should surely give the players and team belief that they can cause issues tonight – Chris Sutton is backing David Turnbull to start.
Score first and things might just become very interesting because this is the toughest test of Group E, playing at the Wanda Metropolitano.
Rodgers on Simeone’s comments
Reporter: “Diego Simeone was full of praise for your team and the style of play. Do you as a club and a squad feel that you have earned a bit more respect given the way you have performed so far?”
Rodgers responded: “I believe so. The cynics will probably tell us we only have one point. But for a club and a team like ourselves, it’s all about improving that level of confidence. That will come through performance.
“We maybe haven’t had the results and points on the board, especially in the last two games, which we would have deserved. But we are very happy with the performance levels. We want to keep that going. We want to see if we can take more points out of the next three games than what we did in the first three.”
Refreshed players
The key players were benched at the weekend as Celtic saw off ten-man Ross County, so there haven’t been many issues in the build-up to the game.
There can’t be any excuses here because Neil Lennon was previously expressing his frustration at the scheduling of Premiership games and European games.
Either way, if the team can win here, then it blow Group E wide open and provide Celtic with the best chance in many, many years to progress to the knockout stages.
But the brutal truth is that if it’s a defeat, then it’s probably about saving your skin for the final set of fixtures.
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