Celtic are less than week away from taking their first steps in this season’s Champions League group stages. In front of what will be a sold-out Celtic Park, the Hoops will face one of the most expensive teams ever assembled in Paris Saint-Germain.
The French giants have made headlines this summer with high profile moves for the likes of Neymar and Kylian Mbappe, their squad highlighting perfectly how difficult it can be for teams like Celtic to remain competitive in modern European competition.
Facing Bayern Munich and Anderlecht alongside PSG, there are many logical reasons to think that the Hoops will find this season’s group stages as tough as last term when they failed to win a match and finished rock bottom.
Still, there are reasons to be hopeful and for Celtic fans, hope will be important. Here are the THREE reasons why the Hoops could at least finish third and progress into the UEFA Europa League…
The Celtic Park crowd are a great leveller
Perhaps the one ace Celtic have in their pocket is the atmosphere created at Celtic Park. It has almost a mythical reputation and for those that experience it, there’s nothing that can quite compare. It even impresses legends of the game.
As an example, just last month goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon, who has made 115 appearances in UEFA club competition stated that he wanted to feel the ‘electricity’ of Celtic Park one last time.
While experienced professionals like Neymar or Robert Lewandowski are unlikely to be intimidated, what the atmosphere does do is raise the game of the Celtic team. It allows them to go above and beyond their ability in search of results and as we’ve seen countless times down the years, it can provide massive shocks.
Teams like Manchester United, AC Milan and Barcelona have fallen victim to these famous European nights in Glasgow, all while at the peak of their powers in Europe.
Who’s to say it won’t be Paris Saint-Germain or Bayern Munich this season?
Anderlecht have started their season poorly
The likelihood is that Celtic will find it tough against Paris Saint-Germain and Bayern Munich, meaning in order to find some sort of progression from the group they’ll be looking to finish third. The good news is that the Hoops drew a team they can be competitive with from Pot 3, avoiding the likes of Tottenham Hotspur, Liverpool and Napoli.
Anderlecht are no mugs, but compared to some of the other teams that Brendan Rodgers’ men could have faced, it’s a kind draw.
The further good news is that Anderlecht are struggling badly at the start of their season and will need to show big improvement if they’re to stop Celtic moving into the UEFA Europa League.
With just five points from their opening five league fixtures, scoring just three goals, the Belgian champions have failed to show improvement on last term.
Losing key player Youri Tielemans in the close season was a blow and it remains to be seen whether he was the irreplaceable driving force behind their good showings in the Europa League over the last two seasons.
Can a stable Celtic capitalise on a team in transition and beat them to third?
The Celtic squad is returning to full-strength
Celtic have already faced some quality European competition this season in the form of the Kazakh and Norwegian champions. They beat both sides with a depleted squad too. With the likes of Moussa Dembele, Jozo Simunovic and Leigh Griffiths missing for some or all of their European qualifying campaign, it’s been a difficult process.
With Dembele due back before the end of September and key defensive talent like Dedryck Boyata already in full training, the Hoops will likely have a full-strength squad for the bulk of the group stage matches.
That’s a big boost to a team that has already shown they are capable of securing big results at home and away in Europe this season. If they can keep their key stars fit and healthy it should go a long way to keeping them competitive. They showed everyone last season they can get results against the likes of Man City and Borussia Monchengladbach, can they go one step further this season and pick up a win or two?