Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers said Friday he had a “burning” desire to improve his team as he challenged the Glasgow giants to complete a domestic treble while making progress in Europe as well ahead of the new campaign.
The first season of Rodgers’ second spell in charge, Celtic won 11 of their final 12 matches to clinch a domestic league and cup double.
They warmed-up for the new season scoring four goals against each of DC United, Manchester City and Chelsea on their pre-season tour of the United States.
But the reigning champions go into their Scottish Premiership opener against Kilmarnock on Sunday with a largely unchanged squad.
Kasper Schmeichel has replaced retired goalkeeper Joe Hart while Celtic brought back Paulo Bernardo on a permanent deal following his loan spell from Benfica.
But Northern Irish boss Rodgers sees no reason to limit the Glasgow giants’ ambitions, telling a news conference: “Our objective is to win every domestic trophy. You can’t hide behind anything other than that.
“We’re in an exciting Champions League format, so we want to get into the play-off stage of that.”
The 51-year-old former Liverpool manager, however, added: “But alongside that for me it will be looking at the football performance and the consistency of that. There were spells last year where we played some fantastic football and probably more so towards the end with some sporadic games in between.
“But now the the clarity is there with everything, I would expect us to really be a lot more consistent.
“From the tactical aspect, we’ve worked on some things over the the pre-season, especially in America, against some really good opponents.
“And it was interesting because one young player of mine who played for Chelsea, a former player, he said after the game that ‘it’s a Brendan team we’re playing’.
“So that was a good sign for me.”
Nevertheless, Rodgers accepted that part of his quest for improvement would involve bringing new players to Parkhead.
“Certainly complacency doesn’t ever enter my mind because we didn’t win three trophies last year,” he said “So domestically, we’ve got to make up on that and then we have to be better in Europe. As simple as that. We can’t beat about the bush. We have to be better.
“But in order to be better, you need quality. And if you’re going to improve on that, then we need to find that. It’s as absolutely simple as that.”
Rodgers though made it clear he had no wish to initiate a “toxic” discussion about transfer dealings, saying:”Do we want to improve? Yes. Does the board know that? Yes.
“But with the tools that we have at this moment in time, the players are working very, very well and I would expect us to add to that and be stronger by the time the window closes.
“I’m quite relaxed. I’ve known what I’ve always wanted, but there’s so many moving parts in transfers.”
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