Leigh Griffiths has claimed Celtic are ready to "blow away" the opposition this season including Rangers - for as long as the Ibrox side can stay in the Scottish Premiership.
The confident striker believes new manager Brendan Rodgers is putting together a team strong enough to dominate the league in a manner which will make it impossible for anyone to do anything about the Parkhead club winning six titles in a row.
A complaint from Celtic fans in recent seasons was the way their team failed so often to put weaker teams in their place, despite winning trophies during the Ronny Deila era.
However, last season's top goalscorer and double Player of the Year insisted things were about to change.
Griffiths said: "The way the boys are thinking, and the way the manager wants to play, if it goes the way we want and comes off perfectly, we’ll just blow teams away
“But that’s down to us players to execute that match plan. If we do that, we’ll really hurt teams. We need to be even more ruthless than we were last season.
"I tend to concentrate on what we do. The gaffer has made his first signing now (Moussa Dembele) and we’re looking forward to pre-season.
"I’m sure the gaffer has said before that he’s inherited a very good squad. The quality is obvious. If he can add one or two that will make us a formidable force.”
Griffiths has one goal against Rangers for Celtic out of two games, a figure he would love to increase when the two sides meet for the first time on league business since the Ibrox club fell into liquidation in 2012.
And he couldn't resist a dig at the other side of Glasgow as he looked forward to scoring many more against the men from Govan.
Griffiths said: "My aim is to score more Old Firm goals. I’m here for another four years – and hopefully even more after that.
“So hopefully, if Rangers are still in the league over that time and we’ll have 16 derbies in four years.”
While some Celtic fans, and they are a fading number, claim not to have missed the Glasgow derby, Griffiths cannot wait for the rivalry to begin again.
He said: "Everybody is looking forward to those games, not just the players but the fans, the management, the staff. Everybody connected with the club will be happy that these games are back.
“September 10 is the first one (Old Firm fixture) booked in, so everybody will be fixating on that. But, first and foremost, we’ve got three league games before then – we need to win them and get off to a great start.
“We want to have nine points going into that game – and we also want to be booked into the Champions League.
“We look forward to it, whatever happens. We’ve been handed a difficult first game, away at Tynecastle on day one, but we showed a great team performance the last time we went to Gorgie – we got the three points to effectively wrap up the title.
“It will be good to go back there, a hostile atmosphere, the Celtic fans in full voice, the Hearts fans in full voice – you’ve got to enjoy that.
"It will be a really good test for us and a great chance to get off to a winning start.”
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