Celtic target Cho Gue-Sung has praised Hoops countryman Oh Hyeon-gyu for his performances for South Korea and insisted he has no regrets that his own move to Parkhead collapsed.
Ange Postecoglou seemed set to sign Cho for most of the transfer window, but the deal crumbled after a fee could not be agreed with his club Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors.
The Hoops turned their attention instead to Oh and splashed out £2.5 million to Suwon Bluewings to land him and the 21-year-old has already scored three times for his new club.
Both played for South Korea in their midweek international games with Colombia and Uruguay and Oh even replaced Cho in the first game as a sub. And Cho admits he was impressed with the Celtic youngster.
He said: "I have known Oh Hyeon-gyu would be a good player for a long time and you can see he's really starting to show it now.
"He did really well when he came on and was unlucky to see a goal ruled out.
"There is a lot of competition for a place in the national team. It's up to me to show the manager I deserve to play.
"When my move to Celtic didn't happen, honestly I was upset.
"But I have no regrets about not going to Europe right away. I still think I have a lot to learn as a striker.
"I am convinced I will get another opportunity someday.
"My ambition last year was to go to Europe, but now it has changed. I have to focus on training and work hard.
"I ask myself the question, if I don't get to go to a club in Europe will I regret it for the rest of my career? And the answer is no."
Meanwhile, Celtic manager Ange Postecoglou has challenged his team to find their best form in the home straight of the season – even though they have just won their last 14 consecutive games.
Celtic take a healthy lead into the final nine fixtures of the cinch Premiership season and have a Scottish Cup semi-final against Rangers to look forward to at the end of April.
The champions saved their best form for the end of Postecoglou’s first season in charge and the former Australia head coach has again devised his approach to ensure they can peak at the right time again.
Speaking ahead of Sunday’s trip to Dingwall to face Ross County, Postecoglou said: “We are looking at it from a yearly planning perspective.
“At this point of the year everything gets decided so we wanted to be in a really strong position at this point. We have achieved that.
“But the second part of that was that we want to finish the season strongly, as we did last year, with our best form and where we are at our strongest at this time of the year. That’s been the plan all along.
“If you look at the first stretch of games and then post-World Cup, in that middle section we were stronger than the first section and the plan is to be stronger in the final section. That’s all theory, we have still got to get down to the practicalities of doing it.
“The players are ready to go and they understand what needs to be done between now and the end of the year – beginning on Sunday – to put in a strong performance and finish the season in the manner we want to.”
