TIME IS ON OUR SIDE

Lustig says Celtic can take full advantage of jet-lagged Kazakhs to march on in Europe

IT HAS just gone 2.30am and the east end of Glasgow is no place for a footballer from Kazakhstan to be wandering around in a state of lethargy. That was the rough time on the body clocks of the Shakhter Karagandy team in 2013 and Astana 12 months ago when their visits to Scotland ended in tired and emotional downers at the hands of rampant Celtic teams.

While so much has naturally been made of Celtic preparations for the 3,000-mile trek to the Kazakhstan capital through the time zones in pursuit of a Champions League place in recent seasons, qualifying veteran Mikael Lustig always suspected the draw was worse for the opposition going west. There is more than a speck of evidence to back this up.

The Scottish champions have taken advantage of wilting Parkhead guests from central Asia to advance in European competition and Lustig is confident about the tempo at which the current Celtic side is operating suggests Wednesday night will be the third time in a row.

Karagandy succumbed to a 90th-minute James Forrest aggregate winner four years ago in Glasgow. Last year, Astana imploded in stoppage time with two red cards either side of Moussa Dembele’s late, great pressure penalty.

Lustig said: ‘With the time difference, I believe it’s harder for them to come from Kazakhstan to play here “in the middle of the night”. I don’t know how they prepare for that, if they try to stay on their Kazakh time or if that works.

‘But, for them, they play at 2am or something like that. Maybe us scoring late goals at home to these teams is about fatigue. But I hope it’s more that we are a better football team that makes them more and more tired in the legs.

‘The way we are playing right now, I hope can we expose that in them. Last season was such a tight game. We know it’s going to be a tough game again. But we are going to make the most of it.

‘We are going to go out to get a really good result. It’s very important to do that. We want to make the most of it in the first leg and take a good result to Kazakhstan. It’s important to keep a clean sheet but, hopefully, we can score some goals as well.

‘I think when we go there we will stay on British time and it shouldn’t be that bad for us.’

Astana’s 14-match unbeaten home run in Europe provides extra motivation for Celtic to carry a healthy advantage from the first leg on their travels. The Kazakh club’s road record hints that is well within the compass of Brendan Rodgers and a squad vastly improved since the third qualifying round meeting in 2016/17.

Celtic sentenced Astana to a Europa League campaign last season during which they were beaten 4-1 by Olympiakos, 3-0 at Young Boys and 2-1 in Nicosia on their away nights.

In contrast, Lustig can count himself among the most streetwise Celtic stars with no concerns about digging out a result, if need be, a week on Tuesday following a seven-hour flight to Kazakhstan.

He was part of a Sweden squad that, three weeks after Celtic’s 2-0 first-leg loss to Karagandy amid scenes of sheep sacrifice, triumphed 1-0 in World Cup qualifying thanks to a Zlatan Ibrahimovic goal in the opening seconds in Astana.

In July of last year, he was part of a makeshift defence boasting centre-halves Eoghan O’Connell and Efe Ambrose that emerged with a priceless 1-1 draw from central Asia. Another Kazakhstan stamp on the passport holds not one fear for Lustig’s ambitions of another memorable Champions League campaign. He said: ‘I’ve been there a few times but I haven’t seen much — there’s the hotel! Astana is really nice, very clean.

‘It’s a tough place to go. We’re playing on astroturf. The draw is a tough one for us but I think the heat wasn’t that bad the last time we played there. We’ve done it before and it has been okay.

‘I don’t find it too difficult. To travel six, seven hours feels alright to me. We go on Sunday, so we have the Monday as well. When the game starts it should be fine. If you want to have sleep at the normal time you just make sure your room is dark.

‘When I saw the draw, there were mixed feelings. The other teams we could have got were tough teams and quite similar and familiar too, like Qarabag or Hapoel Be’er Sheva. The Champions League play-off games are special.

‘Maybe the first rounds are a

I hope it’s us being a better team that makes Astana tired

little bit easy but, otherwise, when you see last year and the year before, it’s been tight games all the way through. Everyone knows it’s a 180-minute game, so it is special and it is tense.

‘We know the team we face from last year. But I think we are more ready compared to last season. I think we have come a long way. We have a couple of injuries right now but the way we are playing our football is different.’

This is the 30-year-old’s sixth shot at negotiating the hazardous course towards the elite European group phase since signing for Celtic from Rosenborg in 2012.

He might once have described Celtic as the worst club a player could join if summer holidays were a family priority but the right-back would never have it any other way now he’s sampled club football at the top level.

A Celtic capture with his profile — young, inexpensive, an international — often views Glasgow as a stepping stone to England. Lustig, however, was delighted to sign until May 2019, a commitment of at least sevenand-a-half seasons in Scotland.

‘Even if we don’t reach the Champions League, I think I would still be happy as a Celtic player,’ said Lustig. ‘But obviously it is really big for the club, for the fans, for the players. That is our main goal. Hopefully, we can do it.

‘I’ve never been this long at a club before. The average for players is maybe two to three years. But I am really grateful to be at such a big club as Celtic and I’ll be here a couple more years.

‘From my perspective, to be at such a massive club, it is all I’ve dreamed of. To play Champions League, to play in front of 60,000 in the league. It’s quite easy to say why I want to stay.

‘Since I came here my focus has been Celtic and I’ve enjoyed every minute, so I’m not thinking about anything else.

‘In football, if you’re not good enough you’ll maybe just be here one or two years. If you are really, really good it might happen for you the other way. So I’m maybe somewhere in between!’