Final question put to Rodgers that’s missing from ‘Full’ Media Conference video

Brendan Rodgers spoke to the media ahead of the Premier Sports League Cup quarter-final tomorrow afternoon at Firhill against Partick Thistle. In what was a vastly different atmosphere to the week before, the Celtic manager didn’t want to revisit the controversies of the week before.  Here’s everything that was said including the final question that never made the cut on Celtic TV’s YouTube channel…

Q: Brendan, how’s the squad looking for this weekend?

Brendan Rodgers: “Yeah, pretty much the same as last weekend in terms of availability. Auston (Trusty) and Tony (Ralston) are doing really well on the pitch now and should hopefully rejoin the group next week. Both of them were in boots, so they’re out of that and hopefully good news for them. Alistair is doing really well, not close yet to playing, but will hopefully be out on the pitch again soon, finding his strength in the gym, but apart from that, the squad is strong.”

Q: How much are you looking forward to this Premier Sports Cup match on Sunday?

Brendan Rodgers: “Yeah, very much so, I think it’s a competition we’ve enjoyed throughout the years and certainly my time here, I’ve always put a real focus on that to do well in, so we’re currently the holders of it, so we want to make sure that we can not just defend it but win it, and that’s the plan.”

Q: How much does it give you for the rest of the season when you have a good run in this competition, when you go on and win this competition?

Brendan Rodgers: “Well yeah, we’ll have experienced both because obviously my first season here (after my return) we didn’t and then we went on and we still ended up having a really good season. But I think it gives you that real focus and purpose at the beginning of the season and obviously it’s an opportunity to get to Hampden. You know we want to get there. We respect Partick and Mark (Wilson) and his team. So we have to go there and play well to get to the semi-final.”

Q: Just going back to last weekend, Brendan, great result, but just a few minutes after full-time, the fans are already chanting, ‘Sack the board.’ What’s going to have to change, and what’s going to have to happen for the focus of the supporters to be fully on what’s going on in the pitch as opposed to what’s happening off it?

Brendan Rodgers: “Well, I think the supporters are focused on what’s going on the pitch. I think just by your nature of how you say what you said, we done really well but, so let’s forget what you said after but, and then just talk about the football. The football, the team is in a good place domestically. The team is strong, the spirit is strong. We were working on finding rhythm. You know I think this time last year, the team was in great rhythm. Why? Because there were lots of players who played there before, and we were just adding the likes of Nicolas Kuhn, and then we had everything in the team. Speed, dynamism, Matt O’Riley hadn’t gone. So the team is in a great place.

This year now we’ve made changes, players have gone, new players are coming in, and young players are making their debuts. So it takes a little bit of time for the rhythm. And rhythm breeds confidence, and that’s what we’re looking to find as the team and that will come because the spirit is good, the environment is good. And we will get there. But in the meantime, what is important is to win, and like the games like last week, in my opinion, we deserved to win the game. We had to really go to the very end and show that mentality to win, and when we did win, we were very happy. So everything else is the side show for you guys. For me, the focus is the football.”

Q: Is there any worry, though, if that was to happen again? It could become a bit of a distraction, not for the players, but a distraction from the good work that’s actually going on.

Brendan Rodgers: “Sorry, if what could happen again?

Q: If there was another fan protest.

Brendan Rodgers: “Well, I think whatever happens on that front, we still control how we start the game, how we press the game, how we pass the ball. That’s all within our control. So the supporters, I’m not going to tell the supporters how to feel, how to act. We want this club to be tight together. And we saw when the supporters did come in, they helped the team and that’s obviously what we want. But I can’t tell supporters how to act. But what I can say is that we can control the start of games. We can control what we do within the game, and that’s what our focus is on.”

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