Strachan stands by his ‘Holy Goalie’

CELTIC manager Gordon Strachan will stand by under-fire goalkeeper Artur Boruc by keeping him in his side for tonight’s Champions League clash with Villarreal.

The Poland international’s latest high-profile error this season came at Hibernian on Sunday when he let a speculative 45-yard strike from John Rankin slip through his body to help end the champions’ 12-match winning run in the Scottish Premier League.

Numerous pundits and former Celtic players have called for Strachan to drop the player, who has also been plagued by highly-publicised off-field problems this season.

However, Strachan is refusing to listen to Boruc’s critics, restricting himself to one simple statement on the matter.

“Artur is going to play (tonight) and that’s all I really want to say on the subject,” he said.

Celtic striker Scott McDonald was more lucid on the subject of the man known as the ‘Holy Goalie’, claiming the controversial keeper enjoys the backing of the whole dressing room.

“People can make what they want of Artur but we can see his qualities in training each day,” the Australia international said.

“I back him 100% and I am delighted for him that he is going to play tomorrow and I’m sure he will have a good game.

“Everyone makes mistakes but it is more highlighted as a goalkeeper.

“Unfortunately for Artur and us at the weekend, that was the case.

“Everyone in the changing room is fully behind him and that will be shown (tonight).

“He is a top lad, an honest professional and he held his hand up at the weekend and that’s all you can really ask.

“He will be going out there tomorrow night wanting to prove a point.”

“He’s a strong character as we all know so he will take it on the chin and get on with it.”

After reaching the last 16 of the tournament in the previous two seasons, Celtic’s interest in Europe will end tonight, with not even the prospect of UEFA Cup football to look forward to.

However, Strachan tried to put this season’s European disappointment in perspective and looked forward to having another go next season.

“We’ve had a lot of enjoyment out of the Champions League in the last three years,” he said.

“And I think we deserved more points than we have this season.

“On good nights we would have won both matches against Aalborg, we might have hung on for another six minutes to beat Manchester United and we feel we put in a good performance against Villarreal.

“So there are a lot of things that we believe we did right but we didn’t get the breaks or we didn’t have enough ability to get through this time.

“But we will try and put that right by trying to win the championship and to do better next year.”

Aiden McGeady will start tonight as Strachan promised to reshuffle his side with one eye on Saturday’s Scottish Premier League clash with Hearts at Parkhead.