Celts were better under Lennon, says Malmo star

MALMO danger man Vladimir Rodic has thrown down the gauntlet to Ronny Deila’s Celtic by insisting the Scottish champions are not the force they once were.

Speaking as boss Age Hareide tried to backtrack over his own claims that the Swedes are a superior side, winger Rodic stirred up more bad feeling ahead of this week’s Champions League qualifer in Glasgow by declaring the hosts were a tougher proposition under Neil Lennon.

‘I know Celtic are a good team but they aren’t as good as they were two or three years ago,’ said the 21-year- old Serbian, who scored his third goal in six games in Saturday’s 2-0 league win over Gefle and is seen as the biggest threat in Wednesday’s first leg.

‘ They have an advantage on Wednesday at home but there will be a lot of pressure on them in front of 60,000 fans. We just need to be focused.

‘I’d say this is going to be the biggest game of my career. Playing against Red Bull Salzburg in the last round was massive, but now we are going further and I feel excited and confident about what’s ahead.

‘I’m scoring goals and playing well, but we are all in good shape right now. Hopefully we can do enough to get in a good position for the second game.’

Hareide will hope Rodic’s words don’t come back to haunt the Swedes as the manager tried frantically to play down his own comments that Malmo were a

better side than the Scots. He insisted too much was made of his remarks in May when he said: ‘We’re better than Celtic, better than Rosenborg. Molde might come close to us but nevertheless we’re better. We’re better than Copenhagen.’ They have already drawn a stinging response from fellow Norwegian Deila, with Hareide saying yesterday: ‘The comment was about the teams who were in the group stages (of the Champions League) at that time. Not now. ‘We are building a really good team here and we have only three players left from back then. When we played Atletico Madrid last season, we had better ball possession than them, we ran more than them and that was the comparison I was making.’ However, an angry Deila said over the weekend: ‘We will see on Wednesday when (Malmo) have to show they are better than these teams. ‘It’s good they have confidence but we know how good we can be and how good we are at our best. ‘European games are settled by small differences. ‘You have to be disciplined and have a plan. I don’t know if he meant it in that way but we will fight to show he is wrong. ‘It puts pressure on the people who say it. If they put the standard up there and say they are better than teams in Scotland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark, then we will see on Wednesday.’