Pivotal shift for Celtic

Amid all the consequences of Champions League group stage qualification, lies a subtle shift in the calendar for Celtic that could prove pivotal.  The club has started competitive football for recent seasons in the first or second qualification round, often in the first week in July.  Added to our habit of reaching (and winning) the Scottish Cup final, Celtic’s close season has been truncated into a period of between six and eight weeks.

This year, we will have an impressive 11 weeks to rest and rebuild before the cinch SPFL Premiership campaign gets the competitive season underway on 30 July.  Consider what that differential means for the fitness coaches.  They were previously tasked to allow the players sufficient rest, then accelerate their return to peak condition to avert a potentially disastrous exit from European competition.

In recent years, this has resulted in giving players as much time off as possible before a three-week fitness ramp up.  You and I can speculate on what impact this has on Celtic’s multi-season catalogue of soft-tissue injuries.

Preseason is also when the base layer of endurance is laid.  Players can do speed work between games, but they cannot do endurance work and play a game five days later.  This training is only effective if it exhausts and breaks muscle fibre, allowing a natural period of regrowth, which builds the muscle.  Squad-wide, it does not happen during the season.

We have seen enough hamstring injuries, as well as Celtic players looking exhausted late in games, to know we have preparatory issues to address.  We also know the fitness coaches are not given the opportunity to work on either matter effectively.  This close season is such a change to the norm, the techs at Lennoxtown will have no realistic experience of how best to spend the valuable weeks handed to them.

Getting it right could extend the careers of the likes of Callum McGregor.  It will also make the type of football Ange Postecoglou wants to play more achievable.