Martin O’Neill has the press room in stitches after sharing his thoughts on Kasper Schmeichel

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Kasper Schmeichel will be returning home ahead of Celtic’s Europa League clash against FC Midtjylland on Thursday.

The Denmark international, who was born in Copenhagen, has never played club football on home soil before, but will get his chance on the European stage with Celtic.

At the age of 39, this is the final leg of Schmeichel’s glittering career, and this is his second season with the champions of Scotland after joining under Brendan Rodgers.

Ahead of the Midtjylland match, Celtic’s number one keeper addressed the media alongside Martin O’Neill, and the returning boss did what he does best.

• READ MORE: Martin O’Neill’s last European game as Celtic manager saw the Hoops crash out of the Champions League

Martin O’Neill praises Kasper Schmeichel in his own unique way

O’Neill has a dry sense of humour, and after Schmeichel had addressed members of the Danish press by speaking in his mother tongue, his manager was asked to share his thoughts on the shot-stopper.

In his own unique way, O’Neill joked that he would be ‘disparaging’ of Kasper because he might have just been negatively talking about his manager.

That’s when O’Neill gave Kasper, son of Manchester United legend Peter Schmeichel, his flowers by mentioning how he has fared in his career, given who his dad is.

“If he has been, as he has been speaking in Danish (for the Danish media at the press conference), disparaging about me, in that time, and I don’t know about it, then I can be equally disparaging of him,” joked O’Neill with the press and Kasper laughing.

“Will he ever live up to his father’s reputation? Who knows?

“He hasn’t made a bad attempt at it, anyway. I think he has ten caps to beat his dad, and that’s some going.”

O’Neill praises the leaders in the Celtic dressing room

The performances from Celtic since Brendan Rodgers left the building have been night and day.

O’Neill and Shaun Maloney deserve all the praise for this quick turnaround, but it hasn’t come without the help of a few leaders in the Celtic dressing room.

“Absolutely,” responded O’Neill on leaning on players like Schmeichel since he returned. 

“Yeah, absolutely. Of course. Really, really important. Big player. Big player. Won the Premier League with Leicester. Fantastic achievement. Absolutely terrific.

“More importantly, he has made big saves. Big saves. Save at Falkirk. I think we were 1-0 up at the time, and I think he made a really good save. I think he made a really good save. Rangers could have equalised. He blocked it.

“Yeah, of course. Leaning on him. Absolutely. Leaning on McGregor and James Forrest, I think, has done great for us. I genuinely couldn’t be more pleased, and I am pleased he is here.”