Czech organiser's glowing Celtic review; explains why they chose Hoops for special friendly

By David Walton

May 9, 2022

Czech event organiser Matej Sturala has explained why they decided to choose Celtic for the centenary friendly against Banik Ostrava this summer.

The Hoops will travel to the Czech Republic on July 13th after their pre-season tour of Austria. The players will take part in a special friendly match marking Ostrava becoming 100 years old.

Like the Celtic supporters, Banik Ostrava supporters helped the club build the stadium during their early days. This came after they arose from a coal-mining community.

And Sturala, the director of the centenary celebrations and one of the main organisers of the match, has explained the decision via the official Banik Ostrava website:

“We are glad that the long negotiations have been completed and that today we can say with certainty that Baník will play against Celtic.

“I don’t think we could have made a better choice. Celtic is one of the most famous European clubs, Glasgow is an industrial city similar to Ostrava and Celtic fans are very similar to the miners’ club in their dedication.

“I believe that we will welcome Celtic as a new Scottish champion and participant in the UEFA Champions League group stage.”

Banik Ostrava trip an important game in Celtic’s pre-season prep

There will likely be a more laid-back and celebratory atmosphere inside the Municipal Stadium come kickoff on July 13th. However, that doesn’t mean that it won’t be an important game in our prep work.

During Celtic’s time in Austria, we’ll face a succession of fixtures before the game in the Czech Republic. The latter we would hope will see a sharper and fitter Celtic take to the contest. Considering the game will be taking place just over a fortnight before the Scottish Premiership starts up again, we would hope to be in decent shape.

Celtic will of course round off their friendly fixtures against Blackburn Rovers and Norwich City respectively at Parkhead. Even at this stage, the schedule looks packed ahead as we look to spearhead our likely title defence with a strong start.

But it shows the reputation Celtic has across Europe that we’ve been selected as the number 1 choice from Banik Ostrava’s organisers.

Hopefully, we give a good account of ourselves and make the game as much of a spectacle as we possibly can, even if it is a friendly.

The Hoops support will certainly be in good voice, with as many as 800 tickets hopefully going to the Celtic fans [Celtic SLO].

In other news, How much it will cost Celtic to keep the current squad together this summer