Wilfried Nancy has had quite the baptism of fire at Celtic.
Between his two games, he has already experienced the rigours of managing both domestically, and against top European opposition.
But in Sunday’s Premier Sports Cup final, it will reach another level. It will be a completely different game to the 2-1 defeat to Roma, but Celtic fans know the threat posed by St Mirren.
Nancy went with an unchanged side from his opening defeat to Hearts, but made three substitutions at half time, leaving questions over his selection for the final.
And speaking ahead of the Hampden showpiece, he admitted that he wanted to change the line-up for the game, but felt he couldn’t in the end.
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Wilfried Nancy on Celtic team selection before Roma tie
Benjamin Nygren, Daizen Maeda and Kieran Tierney were all withdrawn at the break on Thursday.
You could put that down to their performances on the night, but these are also three of the players who have played the most minutes for Celtic in the last three months.
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Speaking ahead of the final, he said he was left ‘in between’ because of the uneven spread of minutes among the squad.
He said: “I wanted to do more rotation, to be honest with you.
“But again, I am in between regarding that. A few players didn’t play a lot, also, in the last six games. So I need to balance that a little bit.
“First of all, also, is to watch a lot of St Mirren properly, the way they play. I know them, the way that they play – and after that, I will pick the team that I think will have a good performance.
“The two games that [St Mirren] played have been different. The last game, they were really aggressive, really well organised, so we struggled to score goals, and they had opportunities.
“So I expect a game, because a final is also about emotion. This is how we can balance the emotion; play with the emotion, but balance with the emotion.
“I think the team is going to be able to be good at that, and maximise their chance to win. But it’s going to be a tough game, as we know.
“But again, we are ready to accept this challenge, and do whatever it takes to win the game.”
The final kicks off at 3.30PM at Hampden on Sunday.
Name your Celtic front three for Celtic’s cup final against St Mirren…
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