CELTIC STAR James Forrest reckons that this Celtic team has unfinished business as far as European football is concerned and he can’t wait to get back to playing continental football next season, preferably in the Champions League.
Celtic have fallen at the Europa League round of 32 in both of the last two seasons and there is a frustration in the squad, as expressed by Jamesy, that perhaps they could have gone a little but further this year.
The home game against Valencia started well enough but developed into a below par performance from the Hoops and the La Liga side simply picked us off and took full advantage of a few errors.
Celtic were much better in the Mestalla on Thursday and were the better side until Jerry Toljan was sent off on 38 minutes for a ridiculously soft second booking – even if the German referee reckoned it was a foul to Valencia (Brendan Rodgers thought it was a free kick to Celtic), then surely having just booked the right back the sensible thing would have been to have had a word in his ear and suggest that he was now playing on thin ice.
But Toljan and Celtic’s luck was out and a red card effectively ended the tie. Kris Ajer could have given ten man Celtic the lead before Valencia were then gifted the only goal of the game to conclude the tie as a 3-0 win for the La Liga side.
Looking back on it Forrest is as frustrated as the rest of us and can’t wait to get back into European action against next season – but for now it’s all about winning domestic trophies.
“We’ll get back to domestic football, we’ll pick ourselves up and we’ll concentrate on trying to win trophies at home,” Forrest said to the media.
“There’s so much to look forward to, so much to play for and we’ll give that our full focus now.
“No one in that dressing room wants to talk about Trebles and all that, there is far too much to be done before the trophies are handed out.
“We’ve got Motherwell next in the league then a really tough Scottish Cup tie away to Hibs, so you really have to take it one game at a time.
“It’s helpful to have a game right off the back of a disappointment like this and it should be a good one.
Motherwell are on a great run, with six wins on the bounce in the league, so they’ll make it hard for us. Some of the young lads coming through there look really good and they’ll be looking forward to a game like this.
“For us, it’s hopefully another step towards the title and another great season,” Jamesy said.
On the European campaign the Celtic winger looked back on the campaign and ahead with optimism for next season’s European adventures.
“We’ve managed to stay in Europe until after Christmas for the last couple of seasons now but we all want to go further,” he said.
“It’s that’s the next step, that’s what everyone at the club wants to take. We can look at nights like Thursday and know we did well against a really good team and that has to give us optimism.
“It’s little things that change big games, in Thursday’s case the sending off for Jeremy Toljan. Until then, we were doing really well. Once we went down to ten, it got all the more difficult.
“Even then, though, we stuck to a plan and a shape and we gave a good account of ourselves.”