Celtic’s Viljami Sinisalo plays more for his country than he does for his club.
He has been backup to Kasper Schmeichel since the pair joined the club in the summer of 2024.
Sinisalo is highly-rated, being named in the League One Team of the Year for his season at Exeter before making the move to Celtic.
He indicated that he could leave the Hoops on loan for more game time last week, while on international duty with Finland.
Despite not playing at Celtic, Sinisalo remains part of a squad which has been through a fair bit already this season, with fan protests and managerial turmoil.
He discussed the situation with the Finnish media.
Viljami Sinisalo on Celtic and manager situation
Brendan Rodgers suddenly resigned three weeks ago, being replaced by Martin O’Neill on an interim basis.
The club has since conducted a search for a permanent boss, which has seemingly led them to Columbus Crew head coach Wilfried Nancy.
He opened up on this and Celtic’s tough season in general in an interview with Kymppipaikka.
He said: “Of course it is. As you said, the situation is new. We lost a lot of players in the summer, and a lot of new guys came in. It takes a while for every guy to realize how big a club he is in and what it requires.
“Every match has to be won and you have to succeed. It can’t be that once in three games is good, but every game – three seasons – has to be good.
“That’s part of the deal. Yes, it’s been discussed in the locker room that the coach has changed and we’re still waiting to see who will be the coach. We’re looking forward to it.
“As I said, the group has changed a lot. We are used to winning, but the ball is round, and it is not always that simple.
“There have been so-called golden years. In fifteen years, we have won the championship 14 times. Sometimes it goes like this, and not always as we want.
“There have been a lot of games, where there have been places where we have not scored goals and where we have scored before.
“There have been a lot of injuries, but there’s no need to make any excuses. The club demands winning, and we have a good enough group for that. I hope the situation will change, and it certainly will.”
Viljami Sinisalo and Celtic’s fringe players
Sinisalo may be getting an unsatisfactory amount of game time, but at least he’s registered in the team’s Europa League squad.
The same can’t be said for Hayato Inamura and Shin Yamada who were both brought to Glasgow from the J-League this summer.
Jahmai Simpson-Pusey hasn’t been registered either, and was finally handed his Celtic debut by O’Neill last week.
Paulo Bernardo has struggled to make matchday squads lately, raising questions over his Celtic future amid links with Kilmarnock midfielder David Watson.
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