It has been a good week for Celtic leading up to the Bayern Munich game on Wednesday night.
That Bayern tie was always going to be the main event, that’s why Brendan Rodgers’ thoughts centred around that match as he prepared for games against Dundee and Raith Rovers last week.
Celtic hit Dundee for six in the Premiership in the rearranged game, before beating Raith Rovers on Saturday and progressing through to the next round where several bench players were handed starts.
Kasper Schmeichel was rested and fellow summer signing Viljami Sinisalo was handed his debut in the green and white colours.
The 23-year-old joined from Aston Villa and marked his first start at Celtic with a clean sheet.
Aston Villa were ‘unhappy’ when Viljami Sinisalo left to join Celtic
Joe Hart’s retirement in the summer forced Brendan Rodgers to look for a new keeper, but rather than bring in one new face, two more were added.
Schmeichel, who had played under Rodgers at Leicester City, joined as the senior guy and the one expected to don the number one gloves, which he has done and Sinisalo was snapped up from Villa.
But former Villa right-back Hutton has shared that those in the Midlands didn’t want to part ways with their rising shot-stopper.
Yes, Villa have the Yashin trophy holder – the world’s number one keeper – Emiliano Martinez as their number one, but Hutton stated that there were many ‘unhappy’ at Sinisalo leaving, as he told Premier Sports (08/02/25 at 5:20 pm).
“A lot of the voices at Aston Villa that they were a bit unhappy that he left,” said Hutton. “You can understand, from his point of view, with (Emi Martinez) in front of him. It was going to be difficult for him to get into the team.
“He went on loan to Exeter and he got Player of the Season. He just feels that it’s his time to come out and shine. I think he will learn a lot from Kasper Schmeichel.”
How Sinisalo reacted to making his Celtic debut
Sinisalo is going to face much tougher games than the one against Raith Rovers and it will be interesting to see when Rodgers throws him in again.
Given Celtic’s 13-point lead at the top, will Rodgers throw his number two in for a few Premiership matches?
If that doesn’t happen, then that would be fine, but it will be good to see Sinisalo start against Hibernian for the quarter-final League Cup clash on March 8 because it will be interesting to see how he fairs against a bigger opponent.
But this is how Sinisalo reacted on Instagram to making his Celtic debut.
‘Debut at Paradise🍀 😍,’ wrote Sinisalo ‘Thanks for all the support 💚🤍’.
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