BRENDAN RODGERS is hoping to celebrate his 700th game as a manager in style against Kilmarnock today, and he has set his sights on bringing up his thousandth match as a head coach at Celtic.
Celtic supporters may be wary of declarations of loyalty to the club from Rodgers after the way he left for Leicester City back in 2019, but the Northern Irishman is adamant he is in it for the long haul this time around, targeting at least another 300 games in the dugout.
When told that today's game at Celtic Park would be his 700th as a manager, Rodgers said: “There you go. I look like it as well! Times goes fast, eh?
“I was 35 when I took my first manager’s job. It has been 15 years. I was obviously coaching for 15 years before that. I am very proud of my career, but hopefully we can keep having more exciting moments and exciting times.
“I think you have to have resilience and persistence in management. You know there are going to be ups and downs in it. But I have been very fortunate in my career to have a lot of really good moments and good times and work with a lot of fantastic players and coaches.
“I am looking forward to this next decade now. My target was always to get to 1,000 games as a manager.
“It is a sign of resilience and persistence to keep going and you have to do well. Hopefully I can achieve that here at Celtic and keep looking to win games.”
Meanwhile, Rodgers says he will be careful with his handling of Cameron Carter-Vickers after his star centre back made his return from injury off the bench in the midweek defeat to Lazio.
Carter-Vickers showed signs of rust as he gave the ball away for Lazio’s stoppage time winner, and Rodgers is cautious as he looks to bleed him back into the side.
“We wanted to get him out there,” he said.
“He has trained for a little bit, it was just about getting him into the game, getting him a half hour. “Nat (Phillips) as well was obviously coming back having not played a great deal. So, we managed to get the two of them some game time.
“These things [the mistake] happen. We have to be there to cover each other. We give the ball away in other areas of the pitch. We have to just learn from that.”
