Brendan Rodgers BELONGS in the Champions League as Celtic skipper points doubters to Italian masterclass

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Callum McGregor insists Brendan Rodgers showed why he’s one of the best in the business with his Italian masterclass.

The Celtic gaffer copped flak from some quarters for his aggressive tactics in the seven goal mauling by Borussia Dortmund three weeks ago. But Rodgers silenced his snipers by surprising Atalanta with his set up that helped Celts secure a stunning draw in Bergamo. McGregor insisted it was ridiculous to be critical of the manager after the Westfalenstadion sore one. Wednesday night’s Italy job, however, just underlined why he’s an elite gaffer who belongs in the Champions League.

McGregor said: “Oh absolutely, absolutely, he’s top, top level and I’ve seen that over so many years now. Obviously he’ll feel good about himself after that as well as all the players. It was excellent. If anyone wants to question the manager then they just need to look at what he’s done in football and what he’s done to our club, he totally transformed the club the first time he was here and he’s come back and taken forward a really exciting Ange Postecoglou team that did really well.

“For me, there’s no question that he’s a top manager. When you come to this competition, the idea in the Dortmund game was similar, we got lost as players so we have to take responsibility for that as well. It got out of hand and we spoke about that.

“As players, we’ve got to take responsibility because it can’t always be the manager’s fault, it’s sometimes the players’ fault as well. But the way that we executed the game plan against Atalanta, especially against that man-to-man system, everyone should take the credit because he came up with the idea and the players then executed it.

“It’s a real togetherness and I’m sure he’ll be the first one to say that as well.”

Celtic sit in 20th place in the new look Champions League group stage with four points from their opening three games. McGregor insisted his side are in great shape having got through the toughest two trips in their fixture list with an extra point in the bag few would have predicted.

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The Hoops are now gearing up for back-to-back home clashes with RB Leipzig and Club Brugge and the skipper wants some more epic European nights as they chase a spot in the knockout phase. McGregor said: “Yeah it was probably a bonus point. I think we knew that we could probably get something from the game, we had to bring a big level and all these things.

“But it’s a game that we felt we could get something from, and now that we have it’s a bit of a bonus. With the other games we just have to look at them in isolation and see what we can get and hopefully by the end of the competition in January we’ve qualified or we’re in that playoff group to go and try to qualify for the next stage.

“We just take it one by one and try not to get too up or down in terms of the results, we know where we want to be and we’ve just got to stick together as a group. It’s exciting – we’re maybe ahead of where we should be in terms of points.

"Home games are always important, the next one will be a very difficult game, similar to the Dortmund style the Germans play, it’ll be a tough game and we’ll have to bring a big level to that as well, but hopefully we can get on our game and bring the crowd with us and get another positive result.”

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