Hoops face trip to eastern Europe or Malta

Celtic face a trip to Eastern Europe or Malta in their opening Champions League qualifier after Uefa confirmed the groupings for today’s first-round draw.

The seeded Scottish champions have been told they will face either Malta’s Valletta, Bosnian league winners FK Sarajevo, FK Sutjeska Niksic of Montenegro, Albanian’s Partizani or Saburtalo of Georgia.

It means there will be no repeat of 2017’s controversial trip to Linfield, when striker Leigh Griffiths was targeted with a bottle thrown from the home support in Belfast.

The draw takes place at noon UK time in Nyon, Switzerland and will be followed by the draw for round two.

The Hoops – who only rounded off their historic triple treble campaign against Hearts at Hampden 23 days ago – are due back in action on July 9 or 10 for the first leg.

Skipper Scott Brown has had just three weeks to recharge his batteries since then but insists his side are already going full steam ahead as they bid to clinch a return to the group stages.

In that time since he lifted the Scottish Cup, Brown has squeezed in a trip to Greece with his family as well as a few days in Edinburgh taking part in the latest stage of his Uefa A Licence coaching course. But it was back to business yesterday as he rejoined the majority of Neil Lennon’s triple-treble winning squad at their Lennoxtown base to begin their pre-season preparations.

And whoever Brown’s side face, he is confident they will have enough in the tank despite last season’s recordbreaking efforts.

“I got a nice couple days of holiday – it’s been lovely!” joked the former Scotland captain.

“It’s part and parcel of the game now. It’s almost 12 months a year now and there’s no holiday time or time to relax.

“The Champions League is huge for this club and we deserve to be in it.”

Scott Brown.