Cristiano Ronaldo offers Celtic star a key Champions League example amid 'mentality' love in

Paulo Bernardo reckons Cristiano Ronaldo offers him the ideal example on how to cope with the constant top-level demands at Celtic.

The Portuguese star can’t get enough of the big games as he strives to build his career. As part of Brendan Rodgers’ squad, it’s a non-stop scenario. Huge games, expectations to win and a never-ending challenge to try and keep your place in the team. Currently, Celtic are in another physically and mentally demanding period. Bernardo and his colleagues face Atalanta in the Champions League just five days after a top-of-the-table ding-dong Premiership clash with Aberdeen.

Following Bergamo, there’s another battle against a Euro big gun RB Leipzig, a Premier Sports Cup semi-final against the Dons and crucial league games against Motherwell, Dundee and Kilmarnock crammed into the period before the next international break. Also representing his country at Under-21 level, there is no time for rest during the club shutdowns either, but it’s just how the midfielder wants it.

At a time when the demands being placed onto top-level players is under severe scrutiny and his manager last week speaking about the game soon becoming a 12-month affair, there are some who are either unhappy or won’t cope. However, when your compatriot is one of the world’s greatest-ever players and has been doing it for two decades, Bernardo has the perfect role model.

Ronaldo’s ability got him to the top. His desire and appetite for work and fitness approaching his 40th birthday has kept him there. Bernardo looks at such dedication and graft and said: “Yeah, for sure. I think that is what separates him from the rest of the players.

“His mentality is really strong and he focuses on football like no-one does, so he’s an