Captain Callum McGregor says Celtic have the edge in the Scottish Premiership title race as he dismissed talk of him leaving the club.
The Hoops are currently third in the table, trailing leaders Hearts by three points and two behind Old Firm rivals Rangers.
Celtic, who have won 13 of the last 14 league titles, kick off their post-split fixtures on Saturday at home to Falkirk, live on Sky Sports.
Saturday 25th April 5:00pm
Kick off 5:30pm
“I don’t think I’d be doing my job properly if I don’t think that we had the edge,” McGregor said.
“I see the Celtic team every day, I see how we train, I see what we’ve overcome already this season in terms of a little bit of adversity, changing manager twice, fought back from where we were, we were in a cup final, we’re in another cup final.
“So I see enough signs that the team want to win, they can do enough to win.
“Generally when the team have been under pressure they’ve managed to produce big results, so hopefully we can do that over the next five games.
“We’ve scored a lot of late goals, so that tells you the mentality is there to keep going and keep going.
“I never went into training one day and thought that we were gone. I never ever looked inside the dressing room and seen the players and seen the way that they were and the one thing that struck me was everyone still thinks we can do this and that has been such an important thing.
“I don’t think anyone can point the finger at the resilience of the group or the character of the group. I think that’s been there in abundance.”
‘I want to be here’
McGregor had been linked with a move to Saudi Arabia
McGregor, who has won 24 major trophies with Celtic, was linked with a move to join former boss Brendan Rodgers at Saudi club Al Qadsiah in January.
But the 32-year-old insists he remains focused on winning more silverware with the Parkhead side.
“I’ve always said I want to be at this club.
“I’ve come through since I was eight years old. It’s in my DNA. It’s something I carry with me every single day. I want to be here.
“I just want to make sure that the club continue to push and want to be successful and want to drive.
“And obviously having conversations with the guys upstairs, that is something they want to do. So for me, then this is the place I want to play.
Callum McGregor and James Forrest are the longest-serving players at Celtic
Asked if he wanted to end his career at Celtic, he added: “Yeah. It’s obviously twofold, where if the club think I’ve got something to offer, and then obviously the club, like I said there, they want to keep pushing, they want to keep being successful.
“The one thing you do get when you’re at this club is when you have a taste of success, you want to keep it.
“And you want it every single year and you want to keep pushing and trying to play at the highest level you can.”
Initial post-split games to be shown live on Sky Sports
- April 25: Celtic vs Falkirk, 5.30pm
- April 26: Hibernian vs Hearts, 4.30pm
- May 3: Hibernian vs Celtic, 12pm
- May 4: Hearts vs Rangers, 5.30pm
- May 9: Motherwell vs Hearts, 8pm
- May 10: Celtic vs Rangers, 12pm
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: skynews.com
