Brendan Rodgers has praised the one player at Celtic who ‘has a lot of joy’ against Rangers.
The first name that would come to any Celtic fan’s head would be Daizen Maeda. The Japanese winger has caused the Ibrox club, and James Tavernier in particular, a lot of problems in the last two and a half seasons.
With Maeda looking back to full fitness, the Celtic fans will be looking forward to seeing how he can help the team put Rangers to the sword at Paradise on Saturday.
But it wasn’t Maeda who Rodgers was talking about. Speaking ahead of Saturday’s game against Rangers, the Celtic manager praised Kyogo Furuhashi for the job he did against Hearts in the 3-0 win at Paradise.
Kyogo comes ‘alive’ ahead of Rangers game
It’s a fact that the Japanese striker hasn’t reached the goalscoring heights of last season. With 18 goals so far, Kyogo has hit some decent form ahead of the Glasgow Derby and Rodgers praised his talisman ahead of the big kick-off.
Rodgers said [Celtic YouTube], “He, clearly, has a lot of joy against Rangers and his two goals at the weekend, real quick anticipation of where the ball is going to go.
“He’s so alert and so alive in and around the box.
“And the second goal, it was a great pass by Matt and then it’s what he does best. He plays off the shoulder of the defenders, his timing is perfect to be onside and he finished it really, really well.
“But it will always be about the team. There won’t be one player who will have any greater importance or any greater burden to bear than the whole team.
“So we’ll be very connected in the game and that’s how we will always play.”
Kyogo does have an excellent record against Rangers. Admittedly, it took a bit of time for the Japan international to break his scoring duck against the Ibrox club. But since scoring in the 2-2 New Year draw in 2023, he just couldn’t stop.
A double against Rangers won the League Cup in the same season and Kyogo has also scored in the first two derby wins of this season.
And although he didn’t score in the 3-3 draw at Ibrox, you wouldn’t bet against him finding the back of the net this Saturday.
