Celtic stars 'to meet' the Pope as Brendan Rodgers' side set for private audience after Lazio Champions League clash

Brendan Rodgers and the Celtic players have reportedly been granted a private audience with the Pope.

The Scottish Premiership leaders will face off with Lazio in Rome on Tuesday as they look to mount a late rescue mission of their winless Champions League campaign against the Serie A side. The Scottish Sun now claim that the Hoops will send a delegation to the Vatican to meet with Pope Francis the following day with Celtic invited to a special face-to-face meeting.

But one man looking for divine inspiration is Maurizio Sarri after he blasted his players after a shock defeat to struggling Salernitana. The shock 2-1 defeat to the side rock bottom of the Italian top flight leaves Lazio floundering in tenth place in the league going into the Euro showdown - and post-match Sarri attacked his players' mentality after the defeat.

He said: "I hope that in the Champions League, it's a different story because the team's mentality in the league worries me. The Champions League sometimes works miracles, we'll see if against Celtic we will enter the pitch with a different thought process.

"You can't think of playing a match for maybe 50 minutes as we did. Maybe it's also my fault if some players don't perform and if I decided that it is only my fault, I would be the first to leave. We all must take responsibility here."