Ferencvaros hit Europa league highs last season

It is positive news that we will not face the mid-season Swedish champions next week.  Djurgardens are nowhere near as strong as Celtic, but they will be significantly fitter and by some way better than any team we have faced since Copenhagen in February.

At full strength, Ferencvaros are almost certainly a better team than Djurgardens, and they won through last night with the advantage of home soil, despite being only one game into their domestic campaign.

Unlike last season, their European record read like a history of Hungarian football over the last four decades.  The four previous years brought only one aggregate win in European qualification, against Latvian opposition, with defeats to teams from Israel, Denmark, Albania, Bosnia and Netherlands.

That all changed in season 2019-20, when they eliminated Bulgarian, Maltese and Lithuanian opponents to reach the Europa League group stage.  There, they drew home and away with Espanyol, beat CSKA in Moscow and took a point at home.  Their campaign ended there, as despite having beat Bulgarians Ludogorets Razgrad home and away in a Champions League qualifying round, they lost their Europa League home game, could only draw away, and finished third in the table.

Ferencvaros record last season is enough to give Neil Lennon plenty to think about, but playing at Celtic Park against opponents no fitter than we are, is what we would have hoped for at this stage.