NafisaCELTIC made life difficult for themselves as they rose from the ruins of Wilfried Nancy’s disastrous 33 days to secure their fifth successive title in the most dramatic fashion imaginable.
Twelve points were thrown away following the Frenchman’s baffling appointment as manager after the swift exit of Brendan Rodgers and Martin O’Neill’s first spell in interim charge.
The champions had been written off by many as they sat behind Hearts and Rangers after 32 Premiership matches in which they had suffered eight defeats.
The atmosphere in the east end of Glasgow was grim with chaos and tension both on and off the field.
The pressure intensified with every fixture and skipper Callum McGregor insisted the relentless adversity may actually have BENEFITED the Hoops.
Reflecting on a nerve-shredding campaign, the 32-year-old on-field captain admitted: “Maybe that was good, because it shows everyone that this team have bottle and they can keep going and keep going.
“Come the biggest days, you show up, turn up, fight. Be there. Get results.”
And McGregor and his team-mates responded in emphatic fashion as they claimed seven straight victories while the Tynecastle and Ibrox sides collapsed as pressure levels skyrocketed.
Danny Rohl’s Govan side lost four successive games after the split and missed out on a possible £40million Champions League jackpot by ending the season in third.
Celtic completed the mission with wins over Falkirk (3-1), Hibs (2-1), Rangers (3-1) and Motherwell (3-2) before their epic and emotional 3-1 victory over Derek McInnes’ side at Parkhead on Saturday.
Reflecting on a campaign in which he was linked with a reunion with former Hoops boss Rodgers in Saudi Arabia, McGregor said: “Anyone wants to question what I’m doing for the club, then they’re crazy.
“I’ve been here my whole life, it’s everything to me.
“When the going gets tough, you see people merging into the background, then you see people step forward no matter how hard that may be.
“You’re the leader of the team.
“So, let’s enjoy this title and then see where we get to from here.
“Once the dust settles on this, we need to try and get as much right as we can in the summer, so, hopefully, the club and the team are in the best position for when the Champions League qualifiers come round.
“This place craves Champions League football, it’s a different place when you don’t have it. So, we’ll enjoy the title, we’ll get the Cup Final out the way next week.
“Hopefully, we can finish with two trophies and then the work starts again.
“We don’t just pack up and go home. We keep working.
“When we go again in August, we want to make sure we’re successful, so everyone in the building has to drive to make this place as good as it can be.”
McGregor has now lifted ELEVEN league titles among his 25 honours and, when asked if this was perhaps the greatest of them all, replied: “They’re all big in different ways, aren’t they?
“I’d much rather have won this one earlier by doing things properly at the beginning, because this way we’ve put ourselves in a position where we’ve been under pressure.
“When you find yourself in the position we were in, it’s the individuals in the dressing room who matter, the people around the club, around the building.
“We had every excuse under the sun if we really wanted it. As players, we could have just said: ‘It’s not really on us.’
“But we wanted to take responsibility. We’re Celtic players.
“This club demands success, so however you when find yourself in that position, you have to win. That’s been instilled in the dressing room for a long, long time, so it was good that we could show up again on Saturday.
“Hopefully, we’ll learn lessons from this experience in terms of trying to be as good a football team as we can be and as good a club as we can be.”
Speaking about the incredible influence of 74-year-old O’Neill, McGregor, speaking to the Scottish Sun, added: “He’s unbelievable.
“A man with such massive experience in football, an unbelievable man-manager. He’s been really, really solid when the club needed him.
“But Martin needs good people around him. He needs good coaches. We need good people in terms of personality. We need good players.
“So, I think I’ll go one step further – I don’t think there’s a group of people who could have done what we’ve done.
“That’s probably the most rewarding thing.
“As for the statue, I was just about to say that, yes, it’s probably time.”
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