Viljami Sinisalo was given his first Celtic start in the Scottish Premiership against Hearts at the weekend.
An injury to Celtic’s Kasper Schmeichel meant that Brendan Rodgers called upon Sinisalo to take his place between the sticks for just the second time this season.
Keeping a clean sheet to help Celtic beat Hearts, the young Finnish goalkeeper put in a fine performance in front of 60,000 Parkhead supporters.
And while many Celtic fans will have been pleased with Sinisalo’s efforts on the day, that is nothing compared to how the 23-year-old feels about the home support on Saturday afternoon.
Viljami Sinisalo hails the Celtic Park atmosphere
Sinisalo told the Daily Record [print edition page 40]: “Absolutely! It’s what you want to do. It’s what every footballer wants to do.
“You want to play for a club like this and in front of 60,000 people. So, you never take it for granted.
It’s brilliant.
“I don’t know for sure but it’s probably the biggest crowd that I’ve played in front of in my career.
“And you just want more of that. You get that little sniff of it and you want more. You want to do that every week.
“It can be hard to hear yourself even shouting. I’m trying to scream to my centre-halves to do certain things and they probably can’t hear anything!
“So, little moments you get where you can go closer to them and speak to them, you’ve got to take them.
“But, yeah, the atmosphere again was brilliant. The fans really helped us again. So, yeah, hopefully many more like that to come.”
The impressive stats behind Viljami Sinisalo’s Celtic league debut
Keeping a clean sheet is what every goalkeeper aspires to achieve when they walk on to the pitch but for a Celtic stopper, it is a requirement.
And after completing his first Scottish Premiership 90 minutes, Sinisalo proved himself to be a reliable stand-in until Kasper Schmeichel returns to the Celtic first team.
In stats released by Fotmob, here is how Sinisalo fared for Celtic against Hearts.
- Rating: 7.7
- Saves: 3
- Conceded: 0
- Diving save: 1
- Saves inside box: 2
- Recoveries: 5
- Passing accuracy: 88%
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