IT took Alistair Johnston some time to adapt to life at Celtic when he joined from Montreal in his homeland immediately after the World Cup in Qatar at the end of 2022.
The Canadian internationalist readily admits that he still finds the scrutiny he is subjected to on a daily basis and the pressure he is under to perform every time he takes to the field in Scotland to be challenging at times now.
But the right back, who has just completed another inspired season for the Glasgow giants, knew straight away that Brendan Rodgers would be able to cope with the considerable demands of being the manager at Parkhead when he succeeded Ange Postecoglou.
Many fans were unhappy when the Northern Irishman, who had left for Leicester City before the end of the 2018/19 season, was brought back to replace the revered Greek-Australian after a treble-winning campaign last year.
The difficulties which Celtic endured in the opening months of the new term – key players were missing through injury, summer signings struggled to make an impact and form at home and abroad was erratic - did nothing to convince them he was the right man to lead them forward.
Johnston, though, was always convinced that Rodgers would prove his detractors wrong and come good and he was not entirely surprised when a cinch Premiership and Scottish Gas Scottish Cup double was delivered this month.
“He is a serial winner,” he said as he reflected on an eventful 10 months before and looked ahead to joining up with his national team for their Copa America warm-up matches against the Netherlands and France.
“How he handles the press, how he handles his players, it’s something I have never seen before. He’s so personable. He just truly gets it. I think he really understands what it means to be a Celtic manager and I have enjoyed every moment playing for him.
“I have been lucky in my time here. I’ve had Ange and obviously now Brendan and they’ve both been really special in their own ways. I think you saw it in the first season under Ange. It was a bit stop-start and then in the second year, all of a sudden, it was flying.
“I have a feeling that is kind of the plan for us as well. Obviously, when you get a new manager, there is a bit of a bedding-in period and it takes time. Obviously, injuries didn’t help and things along those lines. But I think we are pretty excited with our group with where we can take this.
“It is going to come down to a really strong pre-season going into, hopefully, a really strong Champions League campaign in a new format, so that’s exciting as well. Of course, you want to be pushing on all fronts, so we are excited for that.”
Johnston adjusted to life on the pitch in Scotland quickly after completing his £3m transfer from Montreal and helped Celtic to complete a world record eighth domestic treble in the second half of last season. However, he confessed that the 2023/24 campaign had been difficult.
“It’s been a bit up and down,” he said. “Injuries, runs of form, runs of out of form, I guess you could say. But, at the end of the day, we came into the last couple of months of the season where we were still competing for two trophies and it was in our hands.
“That is something with this football club - whenever we are living and breathing and still alive in a competition, we are dangerous. We have an experience, just the number of trophies some of these guys have won, you are never really out of it.
“It’s definitely hard. Obviously, there’s the physical demands, but it’s also the mental demands. There’s the pressure day-in and day-out of not only just winning, but performing for this club.
“You want to be competing, you want to be lifting trophies and you want to be playing for a crowd that has demands like that. So it’s always a nice relief and a nice joy when you see the guys lifting up another cup and you can just see buzz the fans get off of it. So it’s been really special.”
Johnston has drawn on the experience of team mates like James Forrest, Joe Hart and Callum McGregor, a trio of internationalists who have also proved themselves to be serial winners throughout their careers, extensively in the past season.
“Dealing with it is something I have definitely learned,” he said. “I have talked to the older guys because their track records are amazing. These guys, Jamesy for example, has lived and breathed it his entire life.
“I’ve learned it, going to the grocery store and even just simple things like that, you are constantly getting bombarded and just recognised. It takes a mental toll on you as well.
“I did struggle with that because it was just something that I wasn’t used to. But talking to the older guys is good. You can see Jamesy, he is never going to go a day pretty much without someone saying something about it [Celtic].
“So it is really difficult because you need to be professional at all times, and you need to show yourself in that best way possible.”
However, the 25-year-old appreciates that he is in a privileged position which millions of fans around the world would love to be in and embraces all of it, even the difficult times, fully.
“You don’t want to feel you are just going through the motions up here,” he said. “You really want to enjoy it, so it’s been great. Getting experience and just learning from these guys how to really enjoy it because it is special.
“There are not a lot of places in the world where the passion is this high and this crazy. Yeah, it can seem overwhelming, but it’s exactly what you want as a footballer. You want to feel like you are playing for something that is bigger than you and that is definitely something at this club.”
