Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
WE HAVE THE BOTTLE FOR THE BATTLE
Brown: This team won’t freeze
SCOTT BROWN last night insisted Celtic’s days of being Champions League panic merchants are over.
And the Parkhead skipper is adamant Brendan Rodgers’ ice-cool assassins can shoot their way past Rosenborg and into the play-offs.
Brown and his colleagues jet-out to Norway today under extreme pressure.
Having drawn 0-0 with the Norwegians in Glasgow six days ago, Rodgers’ team face an evening of intense scrutiny with their groupstage aspirations balanced on a knife-edge.
In the past, Celtic have cracked away from home in such circumstances.
Brown has endured nightmare evenings places such as Braga, Warsaw and Malmo which led to exits from Europe’s premier
competition, but says Rodgers has changed the mentality of the team going away from home. Celtic got through tough tests in Kazakhstan and Israel 12 months ago and also gained group-stage draws in Manchester and Moenchengladbach
The skipper believes that calm character will be on show in Trondheim and explained: “It is a totally different team from any that I have played in.
“We have that belief that we can go anywhere and score goals, even when we are playing against some of the top teams in the world.
“We played against Manchester City away last season and pressed them up the park, made them make mistakes and we got a goal from that.
“It is totally different from the old Celtic where we used to sit back and get 12 per cent of the ball against Barcelona, although we won that game 2-1.
“It is a different manager with a different philosophy and he believes we have enough energy that we can go and press teams, create chances and we have good players as well.
“There’s a belief, even from the fans as well they believe we can go through whether we are playing at home or away.
“That’s brought in from the manager and his backroom staff. That’s been battered into us, to relax and when you are away from home.
“That’s what we thrive off now. When people are booing you and shouting at you, you need to be composed and keep the ball.
“The longer we keep the ball, the more anxious their players will get and, hopefully, the more spaces we can find.
“Before, people would maybe press us and we’d just look for big Georgios Samaras up the park and play off him.
“It’s different now, we don’t have that 6ft 5 centre-forward, so we need to make sure we keep possession.
“The manager’s teams have always done that and it’s working well for us.
“We’re very structured. The gaffer has installed that and we’ve worked so much harder than other teams probably do, we’ve got that fitness and that comes from belief as well.
“The pressure is on both teams. We’ve got 90 minutes, so we need to make sure we control the game.
“If it’s in the last ten or five minutes, we need to make sure we’re in control of the game.”