Brendan Rodgers insists Celtic’s sleeves up victory against the Staggies was every bit as satisfying as the champagne football produced in every other Premiership win.
The champions had to dig deep to maintain their 100 percent start to the season with a late fightback securing all three points. Ross County were rock solid and led from a Ronan Hale penalty before half-time and a shock was on the cards until Alistair Johnston levelled with 14 minutes to go and Nicolas Kuhn pounced eight at the death.
Rodgers admitted it had been a tough week on the road with the Champions League bashing by Borussia Dortmund on the back of last week’s six goal romp at St Johnstone. But he was thrilled to grind out another victory to bounce back from Euro disappointment. He said: “The thing I said in the aftermath of the midweek game was that I’ve got absolutely 100 percent confidence in the resilience of this team, and resilience, whatever way you dress it up, that’s all about grit and determination and fight and we had that in the bucket loads.
“We had to show that and the players did that. So it’s been a really, really busy spell for us. We played seven games now over the course of three competitions in 23 days and the players have won six of those and the loss was against the Champions League finalists. So I tip my hat to them.
“It’s been a really, really good period for us and we’ll learn from a game today because the new guys coming in will see that there’s no easy game and you can’t look for it either. You’ve got to do the work and over the course of the 90 minutes we did the work and got the result.”
Rodgers admitted his Celts didn’t hit top gear in the Highlands but found a way to claim the points. He said: “We deserved to win the game but in the first half we were too slow and too passive. It wasn’t very good in the first half and you give a big credit to Ross County and their organisation. I don’t think there was a lot happening either way in the game but certainly the onus was on us with the team that has the ball to do more with it.
“But it was too slow and we said that at half time. We’re a team that can never look for an easy game and it just looked a little bit ponderous and a bit slow and then we didn’t create enough. So the second half, especially when the subs come on, we bring a new energy to the game and like I say we get what we deserved in the end.”
Rodgers is hoping to have Cameron Carter-Vickers back after the International break and Johnston won’t travel for Canada duty to rest up a back injury. But Greg Taylor is still struggling and is likely to miss the clash with Aberdeen in a fortnight.
The Hoops boss said: “Hopefully they’ll be back. Ali won’t go with the international team, so that gives us a chance to recover him. Because he’s been working very well. Cam will be joining training later on in this week and then have a good week leading into Aberdeen. So that’s good. Greg will just have to wait and see.
“But on that I thought young Alex Valle had done well today. Especially the second half, his positioning was a little bit better. But Greg, we hope he’ll be back. If he’s not for Aberdeen, then not long after that.”
Rodgers will take a Celtic select side to face Sligo Rovers on Wednesday and give somehow his fringe men valuable game time. He added: “I’ll be there. I’ll be taking the team. That plan was in place a few months back. Obviously we’ll need to recover some players.
“But there’s going to be a number of players that need games. So it’ll be a mixture of our first team players in the squad and also some of our young players, because it’s my chance to see them. But yes, we’ll go over there. Always great to go back home. And then we’ll prepare them for Aberdeen.”