Nygren says Celtic squad still feeling LASK collapse
Benjamin Nygren says the wounds from Celtic’s Champions League exit to LASK Linz are still raw, more than a month after a 4-0 aggregate lead was thrown away in Austria.
Benjamin Nygren has admitted that Celtic have not fully moved on from the Champions League elimination that cost the club their place in Europe’s top table for a second consecutive season. Thirty-four days after the collapse against Celtic’s Champions League exit to LASK Linz, the Swedish midfielder says the disappointment lingers, with Celtic having surrendered a 4-0 aggregate lead before losing 5-4 on August 25.
Nygren’s comments were made to local media in Sweden, where he is currently on international duty ahead of his country’s Nations League fixture, and picked up by GlasgowWorld. He described the result as extra tough to take, particularly given the manner of the collapse and what had gone before it.
A second straight European heartbreak
This wasn’t Celtic’s first painful exit at this stage in recent memory. A year earlier, the Hoops suffered a penalty-shootout defeat to Kairat Almaty at the same play-off round, and Nygren says that history made the LASK collapse feel even harder to stomach. His own error is said to have led to LASK’s first goal, the moment that sparked the Austrians’ remarkable comeback in Linz.
The fallout hasn’t stopped there. Since the European exit, Celtic have also suffered back-to-back domestic defeats to Rangers and a home Europa League loss to Ferencvaros, adding to a difficult run that has tested supporter patience. There’s a wider conversation to be had here about mentality and squad response, one explored in the aftermath of the LASK exit, but for now the immediate task is simply regrouping.
Players hurting as much as the fans
Nygren was clear that the players feel the weight of these results just as much as those in the stands. He acknowledged that supporters want Celtic competing in the biggest tournaments and that they’ll be every bit as disappointed as the squad, but stressed the group has to try to make the best of the situation they’re now in.
He also spoke candidly about the demands of playing for a club of Celtic’s size, where every match carries an expectation to win and a heavier-than-usual defeat cuts that bit deeper. It’s a mentality question that ties into the wider concerns raised since Linz about how this squad copes when a tie starts to slip away from them.
Nygren insists he’s grown as both a player and a person since arriving at Celtic Park, and that the pressure is part of why he wanted to play for a big club in the first place. Fine words – but Celtic now need to prove it on the pitch, in the Europa League and beyond. Mon The Hoops.
