Ange Postecoglou needs his Celtic Mentality Monsters to show their insatiability in 13 huge showdowns - Chris Sutton

Jurgen Klopp once called his Liverpool team Mentality Monsters. That’s what Ange Postecoglou’s Celtic stars have been for him. Ruthless attitudes. Coping with absences whilst gaining results in must-win games. No let up. It’s been done at this key point of a season before by the Aussie’s squad and now their challenge is to do it all over again.

There are 13 games for them in 43 days across three competitions before the World Cup and it’s time to once more display that insatiable mentality that’s got them where they are now under the boss. You cannot win cups and titles in this next pivotal period. But being off the pace or making too many mistakes can certainly take them away from you. It’ll shape what comes next.

In the 13 games from this day in 2021, Celtic won eight and drew one of nine in the Premiership, booked a spot in the Premier Sports Cup Final and defeated Ferencvaros home and away in Europe. The only reverse came in Germany against Bayer Leverkusen and even that was a good performance in defeat. Another powerful run of that nature is now required.

Postecoglou will have started assembling his group back together from the international break and he might not like some of the things that he sees. Some boys, such as Cameron Carter Vickers and Carl Starfelt, didn’t even go away with their countries because they were injured. Others like Giorgos Giakoumakis have sustained knocks while they were on duty and Postecoglou is going to have some absences.

Some of the lads will come back flying. Callum McGregor, for example, must be buzzing after Scotland’s performances. It would be remiss of me not to make mention of the Celtic captain for his displays for his country. It actually surprised me during the week to