EVEN amid the tumult of last summer, and Celtic’s poor start to the league campaign that was the result, Ange Postecoglou was at pains to make one thing clear to the raft of players he had thrown together in his dressing room; there can be no excuses.
It was a mantra that got them through that torrid opening spell to the Premiership, when Postecoglou’s evolving squad suffered three defeats in their first six games, and ultimately took them all the way to the title.
If there were no grounds to point to mitigating circumstances a year ago then, there is even less room for it now. Celtic have a settled squad that has been supplemented during this window rather than flooded with new arrivals, and Postecoglou expects continuity as a result, not only in terms of the level of football they produce, but in their mental approach to the campaign ahead.
Postecoglou certainly doesn’t expect the same level of performance in this afternoon’s curtain-raiser that he got in last season’s opening day defeat to Hearts at Tynecastle, not that he particularly buys into the theory - as you may expect - that their situation at the time was any excuse for kicking off with a defeat.
“People go on about that but even with the pre-season we had it didn’t stop us being champions!” Postecoglou said.
“My take on that is that you only know whether you are ready when the games start.
“I’m sure everybody feels they have had a great pre-season. That every signing has been fantastic.
The real test is when the games start.
“We didn’t have most of the guys in at this point last year but we were creating an environment to make sure that the boys didn’t make excuses.
“We were going to roll our sleeves up and whatever challenge came before us we were going to overcome it. It’s the same this year. It’s the same mood, the same mindset.
“We are expecting this year to be a tough battle but we know we have the capability within the group to overcome it.”
Celtic certainly should be better equipped to deal with the wear and tear that comes with the long season this time around, with the depth in their squad allowing Postecoglou to be more flexible with his starting XI than he was able to last term, particularly prior to last January’s transfer window.
“It’s fair to say that the key goal of our recruitment – outside of signing Cam (Carter-Vickers) and Jota – was that I felt we had gaps in our squad last year that meant some players were overburdened, particularly in the first half of the year,” he said.
“We paid a price for that, both individually as a team. Kyogo, (David) Turnbull, Jota, quite a few of them missed chunks of the season because we were forced to play them relentlessly through that first part of the year.
“Hopefully with the recruiting we have done and the availability of a stronger core group of players we can manage that load better. Because once the midweek games start and particularly with the physical and mental toll of the Champions League games, we are going to have more than 13 our 14 players ready for that battle.
“I feel we are better placed to tackle that now.”
One thing that has changed behind the scenes at Celtic has been the make-up of the coaching staff, with Australian legend Harry Kewell joining Postecoglou’s backroom team.
Kewell’s pedigree in the game was only part of the reason that the Celtic manager sought to bring his compatriot to Glasgow, as he looks to continually bring fresh perspectives to his players.
“We have brought in Harry and made a couple of subtle changes to the coaching staff so that people don’t get too comfortable in terms of the voices that they hear,” he said.
“You are always trying to make those subtle changes because from the first day of pre-season you don’t want the players to think, ‘okay, we’re just going to roll out what we did last year’ and expect success to come. That’s not how it works.
“I always try to maintain a dynamic environment where there is an enthusiasm and freshness around the place. Sometimes that’s new voices, sometimes it’s subtle changes around where you train or the way you train.
“It’s not about one person, it’s just about making sure players and staff continue to improve themselves.
“You need that uncertainty there to motivate them to improve.”
The match against Aberdeen will come too quickly for Carl Starfelt as the Swede inches closer to his return from a hamstring injury, while Moritz Jenz is still lacking match fitness, leaving Postecoglou with a dilemma at the heart of his defence.
“Moritz Jenz is fine and Carl’s first session back with the group was today,” he said. “He’s had all the ticks from the medical staff so he was able to join in but Sunday is obviously too early for him.
“We will train him through next week and then have some sort of bounce game over the next ten days. He shouldn’t be too far away from being available for selection.
“Moritz is close. Physically he is in a good place but he just hasn’t the game time that some of the others have. We’ll try and get a couple of bounce games to get make sure he and one or two others – Aaron Mooy is one, Carl another – are ready.”
