Brendan Rodgers hails Celtic's pre-season as best he's had in management career

Brendan Rodgers has hailed Celtic’s pre-season as the best he has had in his management career as the Hoops prepare to begin the defence of their Premiership title.

The Scottish champions recorded three wins out of three on their tour of the US while scoring 12 goals in wins over DC United, Chelsea and Manchester City.

And as they prepare to open the new season against Kilmarnock when the Premiership flag is raised at Celtic Park, the manager believes they are in a good place.

Rodgers also insists that star-player Matt O’Riley won’t be unsettled by recent transfer speculation and says Celtic won’t consider selling him for any bids below their valuation.

The Denmark international has been the subject of recent speculation linking Serie A side Atalanta and EPL club Southampton with big money bids.

He was also linked with a move to Atletico Madrid back in January and there is sure to be interest in the player following last season’s double winning campaign.

Speaking to the media on Friday he said: “We had a good break after the end of last season, now we’ve come back and pre-season has gone as well as I could have hoped for with players looking sharp, fit and strong and we are in a really good place.

“The message is pretty much the same as last season, when you are at a club like Celtic it’s special challenges every single game and that doesn’t lessen just because you had a successful season.

“Our objective is to win every domestic trophy available, and we can’t hide behind anything other than that, we are in an exciting new format of the Champions League and we want to get into the knockout stages of that but alongside all of that I will be looking at the performances and the consistency of the team.

“I think last season we played some fantastic football at times, more so towards the end of the season, there was some sporadic performances in-between but now that we have the clarity of what is expected I would expect us to be a lot more consistent than we were last season.”

On the ongoing speculation linking O’Riley with a move away he insists that Celtic will not be short-changed on a player of that quality just because of the perception of the league he plays in.

Rodgers continued: “I’m very confident the speculation won’t affect him, it’s not easy and that’s just the reality of it, but he is the ultimate professional and he knows he is in a good place here.

“I’ve said it before that Celtic’s a place that you can leave, but you don’t have to and I think he has seen what the last three years, and especially last season with the season he had, what it has given him and the progress he has had in his career.

“He is 23 years of age, so if he plays until he is 35 then he has 12 years left so he is invested in his development and it is clear that he will attract attention.

“But I have said, and not just for Celtic but the Scottish game as a whole, for so long the price that gets set on a player is because of the league and having worked down south for a number of years and knowing the finances involved and the level of player then sometimes the league gets the fee and gets the offer.

“Well it open, you will pay for the player and if you want him, and I know some players that I worked with that have gone for in excess of £30m this window and previously, but we get offers in for the likes of Matt that are, with the greatest respect, nowhere near that.

“So we don’t have to sell, we respect that there will be a point when in a player’s career he will be able to improve the financial aspect of his life three or four times over but there has to be a value put on the player and not just the league he is playing in and for us Matt is a very valuable player.

“So until that valuation is met I have every faith in Matt, on his focus and mentality and you can see it by his performances in pre-season which have been consistently very high that he is a very good place along with the other players.”