Celtic have announced their squad for the knockout stages of the Europa Conference League, with Daizen Maeda, Matt O’Riley and Reo Hatate coming in, and Liam Shaw, Osaze Urhoghide and Ismaila Soro all making way.
With three changes only allowed, it means the likes of Vasilis Barkas and Albian Ajeti have been kept in despite their lack of game time, while there was no place for Yosuke Ideguchi.
Fans on Twitter believe the squad, in general, is now much stronger but they are concerned by the absence of Ideguchi:
It’s a million times stronger than we had available last year
— bhoy doyle (@JimGrah88756958) February 7, 2022
Unfortunately not. We could only make 3 changes to the squad.
— Moravcik67 (@Moravcik67_) February 7, 2022
Hope this doesn’t speak for how long Ideguchi is going to be out for. He made a very promising start.
— Stan (@5tan0c1m3k) February 7, 2022
Turnbull and Kyogo being included has to be a great sign that they are close to being game ready no?
— 🆃🆁🅰🅳🅳🅰🆅🇮🇪 (@TonyDavoren) February 7, 2022
Makes sense for Guchi to be the one to miss out. He’s played the least and realistically if we progress further we’ll have to rotate a lot for matches too
— John McAllister (@john_mcal) February 7, 2022
We are going to win it ain’t we
— Eddybhoy (@1989Eddy) February 7, 2022
Surprised they didn’t remove Ajeti
— Niall Collins (@Colliniho) February 7, 2022
Ideguchi was injured in only his second appearance for Celtic, during the 2-1 win over Alloa in the Scottish Cup. The Japanese international was on the receiving end of a nasty challenge and the knee injury he sustained has sidelined him for four games so far.
Maeda, O’Riley and Hatate’s inclusion will, of course, help the Hoops’ cause as they look to make it past Bodo/Glimt into the round of 16.
