CELTIC boss Brendan Rodgers is confident £15million-rated hitman Leigh Griffiths can shoot the Hoops into the Champions League play-offs tonight.
Last season’s 40-goal man was on the mark last week to give the Parkhead side a 1-1 draw against Astana in Kazakhstan and he is tipped to finish the job in front of a packed audience in the east end of Glasgow this evening.
The opponents released video footage claiming Griffiths punched defender Igor Shitov just minutes before scoring the precious leveller.
Rodgers said: “What events since tell you is how much of a threat they see him as. They obviously respect him so much as a player, they maybe wanted try to get him banned.
“You can only assume that’s why they took the course of action they took, but I have not given it too much thought.
“I always think that to be a winner and to be the best, you need to be on the limit and Leigh plays on the limit.
“That’s what you want as a coach and a manager and, if he had a more Latino name, he would be talked about as being worth 15million quid, for sure.
“Luis Suarez played on edge and he was all right!
“You prefer players to have an edge to their game, but what Leigh has shown very quickly in the short time I’ve been here, is that he’s another player who has impressed me.
“I saw the goals he’d scored before, the quality of the finishes and the technique is top class.
“But what has impressed me more than anything is his tactical capacity.
“That shows me that Leigh is improving and, if he continues that, it’ll bring his game up another level.”
