Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
HOOPS GAFFER SAYS HIS STARS HAVE NEY FEAR
Celtic v St Johnstone Today, 3pm
BRENDAN RODGERS roared Celtic’s
Champions League battle cry and vowed his side will show no fear in the face of Europe’s biggest guns this time.
The Hoops were blown away by Barcelona in their opening group game of last year’s campaign with a merciless 7-0 thrashing at the Nou Camp that taught some harsh lessons about life at Europe’s top table.
But this time he’s backing his side to stand tall when the multimillionaires of Paris Saint Germain stroll into Celtic Park for this campaign’s opening game on September 12th - because they now believe they deserve their place among the elite.
Rodgers (above) said: “If you think too much about it then of course you wouldn’t sleep.
“But our aim is to be competitive in the group and everything has to be without fear.
“One of the key elements at this level is believing in yourself.
“We have good players who are developing and learning and we have to go into these games without fear. If you do your best and give everything you always have a chance.
“And we saw that last year in the improvement from that first game in Barcelona, when we probably did play with fear. Then we developed through and actually looked like a team that deserved to be there after that.
“When you think back to the wave of optimism which came here with Manchester City for the next game – they’d won their first 10 games and they were blowing teams away in the most competitive league in the world.
“But they came to Celtic Park and they got a fright and that was due to the level that our players performed at. “Now we’ve earned the right to be there again let’s go and show that we can make another step.”
Rodgers confirmed moves to strengthen his squad for the challenge ahead are still ongoing ahead of Thursday’s transfer deadline.
Defender Rivaldo Coetzee is all but signed while negotiations continue on their bid to bring Patrick Roberts back for a second loan spell from Manchester City.
Rodgers added: “I don’t want to put a number on it but there are possibilities we’re looking at. The situation with Patrick is ongoing. We will see.”