Carl Starfelt: Celtic doubters made this title win even sweeter

Carl Starfelt admits that Celtic’s early season doubters made lifting the title all the sweeter.

The Swedish centre-back arrived in a £4m move from Rubin Kazan at the end of July just a few days before suffering a nightmare debut in a 2-1 defeat to Hearts on the opening day of the Premiership season.

Starfelt came under criticism as Celtic dropped 11 points in their opening seven league matches to trail Rangers by six points, but he soon formed a formidable partnership with Tottenham loanee Cameron Carter-Vickers that provided the solid foundation for a 32-match unbeaten run that turned the tables and clinched the championship.

"It has been absolutely incredible. I couldn’t have asked for a better first year of my Celtic career," the 26-year-old said.

"Obviously this was our goal all season. We knew it was going to be tough, but now we stand here as the best team in Scotland and champions.

"It has been an incredible journey and we have enjoyed every moment of it.

"Also it was very nice after putting in all this hard work all year to be able to celebrate it in style today with the fans.

"You can see how much it means to all the Celtic fans out there. It really is the best feeling."

Celtic were presented with their trophy after the 6-0 win over Motherwell on Saturday in front of a 60,000 Celtic Park sell-out.

Asked if he though his first season in Scotland would end so successfully after that disastrous opening night at Tynecastle, Starfelt added: “I don’t think I thought this far ahead to be honest.

"Of course I knew that when you come to Celtic you have the demands on you and the goal will always be to become the champions. Obviously we had a bit of a rough start but we always kept believing in ourselves and in the team.