NOT everyone in Scotland is happy about Celtic lording it up in the Champions League.
Derek McInnes joked last week, whilst congratulating Brendan Rodgers, that the play-off win over Astana had made his job a lot more difficult at Aberdeen.
Although the man in charge at Pittodrie is intelligent enough to know that what Celtic do and don’t do in Europe is hardly his priority.
Also, and this is important, Aberdeen and the 10 other Premiership clubs are set to make roughly £325,000 from Celtic reaching the group stage, courtesy of UEFA, which for every club, yes even Rangers, is a welcome boost.
The one club Celtic’s success does have a hugely detrimental effect is their friends over at Ibrox who are already five points behind after three games, two of them being at home.
This is why it is perfectly understandable that nobody with a nose of blue was cheering as the five goals rained down on Astana. Why would they?
However, the reason why everyone else should support Celtic, or at least want them to do okay, is that it would work wonders for the profile of the Scottish game, which in turn would generate more interest, sponsors and cold, hard cash.
Rodgers gets this. It’s why he believes that it is part of his club’s job to show that the best team in Scottish football deserve to be in the Champions League and, therefore, some of the doubters would see that if Celtic are pretty good then perhaps the domestic scene north of the Border isn’t as bad as some would have you believe.
“I think it’s important for Scottish football,” said Rodgers when it was put to him that not everyone in the country believed his team’s qualification to the group stage was worthy of an entire nation rejoicing.
“We have to fly the flag for Scotland. What is important is that we represent the country. It’s not for me in a personal sense as I was in England and people have seen my work. Scotland traditionally was a country, although this is many years ago, which had this wonderful history of qualification for World Cups and all of a sudden there has been a dearth in the last 20-odd years.
“What I believe we have shown, if you watch Celtic play, I would say you wouldn’t see it as a Scottish team, you would see us a European team in terms of how we play, press, the aggression, and also the support. They are patient now because they understand what we’re doing and with that the end result comes.
“But it’s important for Scotland. Let’s not get away from that. We have to ensure we represent the Scottish game as best we can and when speaking with Steven Gerrard and other pundits afterwards on Wednesday, they were really impressed with what they saw with us.”
The internal debate surrounds whether one club being so far away from the rest, and there are many examples around Europe, isn’t a particularly great thing. Nobody is suggesting it’s good for competition in the purest sense of the word. St Johnstone and Aberdeen have started well and there is no reason they won’t fill second and third places; however, they know as everyone does that they don’t stand a chance of doing much to prevent the champions making it seven titles wins in a row.
And as for Rangers, with three league games gone, even the most optimistic supporter knows they won’t mount a challenge this season.
Rodgers, for his part, sincerely believes that if we all look further than our own shores we will see and understand that Celtic doing well is for the greater good.
“You guys report locally on the domestic game but you also have to think what is best for Scottish football, which is to have representation in Europe,” he said.
“And not just Celtic, other teams as well. Players will grow, they will develop, they will get great experience, so you can’t be just satisfied by being okay domestically, your hunger and desire has to be beyond that. If you can do that then players will be getting better and the national team will play at a better level.”
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