Christie says departing Brown deserves a statue at Parkhead

Ryan Christie has hailed departing Celtic captain Scott Brown as one of the “biggest legends” to ever play for the club and believes his achievements in Glasgow are worthy of a statue outside Parkhead.

Brown earlier this week signed a pre-contract agreement with Aberdeen to become a player/assistant manager under new Dons boss Stephen Glass that will draw the curtain over an illustrious 14-year spell at Celtic.

The 35-year-old, who has amassed 612 competitive appearances for Celtic, will move to the north-east at the end of the current season having won ten Premiership titles and five League Cups.

With Celtic still involved in this season’s Scottish Cup, he could add to the half-a-dozen winners medals from that competitionbeforeano-doubt emotional exit. His impact at the club was summed up by Christie, labelling his teammate’s legacy at the club “remarkable".

Christie said: “It [the move to Aberdeen] was obviously rumoured and he was keeping his cards close to his chest. He has done so well over the years and look at the age of him now and this season he has been quality again. I get to see him train and for the age he is and the years he has been playing at the top level he is just incredible. There probably aren’t enough positive things I can say about him.

“From now until the end of the season everybody will be talking about him. Even when he steps away from Celtic nobody can say a bad word about him. It will probably deserve a statue outside Celtic Park because he is one of the biggest legends to play for the club.

“The amount of times people have written him off. They said that when Brendan Rodgers

came in and he was rejuvenated and came again. To be consistently good like that throughout your career is remarkable and players like that don’t come along too often.

“The first thing he looks for is hard work and you need to win his respect. He sets the standards in training every day and week in and week out. If you get his respect then he is quality with you.”

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