Celtic plan ahead of Hearts emerges as two players praised ahead of seismic Jambos meeting
Celtic are next up for Hearts on Premiership business.
Martin O’Neill hopes the positives of Celtic’s second half display against Benfica can refuel his team for a match with Hearts on Sunday.
The Jambos travel to Parkhead in their first trip to Glasgow’s east-end since last season’s painful final day defeat against the eventual Premiership champions. As Hearts opened up their league phase campaign in the Conference League by drawing 1-1 against Nordsjaelland, Celtic were thumped 4-1 by Benfica in the Europa League.
Boss O’Neill watched his side go three goals down by half-time before stabilising in the second 45. He feels that should be a positive sign ahead of hosting the Jambos with substitutes Hasseim Hassan and Callum Osmand catching the eye.
How are Celtic preparing for Hearts?
He told club media: “I said to the players at the end of the game, we should take encouragement from it. Yes, we’ve been beaten in the game, 4-1 suggests that you’re well beaten in a match. But for me, I thought the second-half performance was absolutely terrific and that augurs well for us.
“We’ll try and get our energy back again for the big, big game on Sunday. And we have not given up in this competition, not by a long way. It was a big, big test. I felt the character of this side is something that you want to imbue in the team.
“We said, 3-0 down at half time, the last thing you want to do is crumble, well, far from crumbling, we created the chances in the game. The number of chances we created in the second half, and it was the ability to go forward and take players on with Hasseim Hassan on one side, and obviously little Callum Osmand on the other side. Brilliant.”
Benjamin Nygren meanwhile insists Celtic coming on the wrong end of results like the one against Benfica is part of playing football on the continent against top opponents. The midfielder added: “This is how it is when you play European football.
“You have a lot of games and we are used to playing every three or four days. Unfortunately we didn’t win on Thursday night but we played a good side. We have to focus on the game and to win that game. I try to do as well as possibly every time I play and I think I’ve showed that for a long time.”
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