Celtic match-winning hero Christopher Jullien says he was delighted to pay back the trust Hoops teammates and staff members put in him – after he netted just his second goal for the club.
Jullien scored his first Celtic goal in the 4-1 demolition of AIK back in August but his 89th minute winner against Lazio edged that one a little for meaning.
In fact, it edged out any other prior moment in Jullien’s professional career, as he explained to press post-match.
“I would say that is my best moment because it is my first one on a big European night here,” Jullien said, as reported by the Evening Times.
“Sometimes in France when I was scoring, we were not winning. So I would definitely rank it at the top. All week every week, I can’t joke because I am close to scoring and I don’t score.
“Every evening before every game, the team and the staff are like: It’s going to go in sometime. Keep focused. They keep saying they trusted in me and it was going to come and seeing their faces afterwards meant it was really good.”
Jullien has the potential to add regular goals from Celtic set-pieces
The goal can hopefully act as a catalyst for Jullien in more ways than one. The big 6ft 5in Frenchman is turning into an imperious defender but he can definitely improve his productivity from attacking set-pieces.
Jullien has a knack of getting his head onto lofted balls and, with a little more fine-tuning, he could soon turn into a regular goal scorer.
Hopefully his late Lazio winner can spring Celtic into a new era of set-piece goals. It had been a while since we scored a memorable goal from a corner or a free-kick. Perhaps now is the time for them to become a regular occurrence again.
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