Rodgers hits back at his ‘excessive’ Champions League critics
Brendan Rodgers has called for a touch of realism when it comes to assessing Celtic’s chances in the Champions League.
The Parkhead boss always backs his team to pull off a positive result, but he was stung by criticism following the 3-0 defeat by Bayern Munich in Germany.
The Hoops will hope to shock the Bavarians when they come to Parkhead on Tuesday night.
Rodgers said: “You go into every game, not just Bayern, looking to win the game. Then you find a way tactically to try and do that.
“Sometimes, you can be tactically prepared. But when you are playing against world- class players, they can make a difference.
“The likes of Bayern Munich have a 10- million budget for their stadium repairs. And if they don’t spend it, it gets topped up the next year!
“It’s all relative. It gets to me at some point. That’s why I thought the criticism of the players after Munich was excessive. It was incredible, really.
“I’d love to sit down and find out what people expect.
“To beat Bayern Munich and PSG? Is that what people expect?
“To finish first or second in the group? Is that what people expect?
“I’m a realist and that’s why I never get too carried away with the fantasy of all the spending by the top clubs.
“Look at Manchester City, a team who were middle to bottom of the Premier League.
“Then the owners come in, they sign
Robinho for a colossal amount of money and their spending starts there. “The level of expectancy goes up. “What have they spent? Over a billion? If you look at PSG and what they’ve spent, it’s hard to begin to imagine.
“The best players will always cost the most money.
“We’re trying to grow something here, and trying to develop a way of working at the club that’s about a footballing idea.
“That will hopefully grow and cultivate many players that can go on and achieve a lot of great things for the club, both domestically and in Europe.”
As an added compensation for the Celtic supporters, their manager believes even defeats in Europe make them stronger at home.
He said: “After our win against Aberdeen, Willie Miller made a comment about it being a level of performance from a Scottish team that you don’t see.
“That comes from playing against Bayern Munich when we lost 3-0 away.
“You hear all the daftness about pragmatism after games. If we’re pragmatic, we don’t play like that at Aberdeen.”
Rodgers maintains he still has an ambition to have Celtic in the last 16 of the Champions League within three years of his reign.
He said: “The notion last year was to qualify, this year it was to qualify and then have European football beyond Christmas – that would be a significant step for us.
“Then we want to develop it year on year.”
It looks like Celtic captain Scott Brown will not be included in the Scotland squad to face Holland in a friendly at Pittodrie but could carry on playing international football.
Rodgers said: “I said to Scott that he doesn’t need to decide now. After the Holland game the next matches are March and September, so he’s got time. I told him to have a chat with Malky Mackay.
“There’s maybe an opportunity for Malky to have a look at some other players this time.”
Bayern Munich warmed up for Tuesday night’s visit to Celtic Park with another win under new boss, Jupp Heynckes.
This time the reigning German champions defeated RB Leipzig – pretenders to their crown in recent seasons – 2-0 at the AllianzArena.
The visitors suffered a setback after just 13 minutes when they had central defender Will Orban red-carded.
Bayern pounced upon their one- man advantage and James Rodriguez got the opening goal after 19 minutes.
This was added to seven minutes from half-time by Robert Lewandowski.
The result put Bayern top of the Bundesliga as Borussia Dortmund had earlier lost 4-2 at Hannover 96.