Celtic vs Club Brugge Preview: Team News & Prediction
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Celtic have a glorious opportunity to qualify for the knockout stages of this season’s UEFA Champions League and they continue their strong league phase against Club Brugge.
Kick-off date/time: Wednesday 27th November, 2024: UK – 8:00pm / US ET – 3:00pm / US PT – 12:00pm
How to watch on TV: UK – TNT Sports / US – Not televised
How to watch online: UK – Discovery+ / US – Paramount+
Celtic Preview: European improvement
With 24 clubs qualifying for the next stage of the competition with the expanded format, it helps teams like Celtic that have significantly underperformed on the continent and they have started their hunt for a top 24 finish well with seven points collected from four matches.
Brendan Rodgers’ Bhoys come into this one on the back of a 4-1 demolition of Hearts at Tynecastle at the weekend. The Scottish champions sit three points clear of Aberdeen at the top-of-the-table with 11 victories and one draw in their opening 12 games domestically.
Club Brugge Preview: Belgian inconsistency
Club Brugge have been inconsistent throughout this season but they come into this one on the back of a 7-0 demolition of Janbreydelstadion in Brugge at the weekend thanks to four goals from Greece international Christos Tzolis as well as strikes from Raphael Onyedika, Hans Vanaken and Ardon Jashari.
They pulled off a historic win earlier this month, too, in the UEFA Champions League as they defeated Aston Villa by a goal to nil thanks to a Vanaken penalty as a result of a bizarre Tyrone Mings handball.
Celtic Team News: No fresh issues
Brendan Rodgers has put together a deep Celtic squad for this season so they do often rotate quite a lot. They have no fresh injury concerns or suspension issues, though, so can name an unchanged eleven if they so choose.
Predicted XI (4-3-3): Schmeichel; Johnston, Carter-Vickers, Trusty, Taylor; Engels, McGregor, Hatate; Kuhn, Furuhashi, Maeda
Unavailable: Holm (Injured)
Questionable:
Club Brugge Team News: Couple of injuries
As shown by their demolition of Sint-Truiden at the weekend, Club Brugge have suffered from defensive injury issues throughout this season with Bjorn Meijer sidelined for the Belgians alongside Gustaf Nilsson.
Predicted XI (4-2-3-1): Mignolet; Seys, Ordonez, Mechele, De Cuyper; Nielsen, Jashari; Skov Olsen, Vanaken, Tzolis; Jutgla
Unavailable: Meijer (Injured), Nilsson (Injured)
Questionable:
Key Stats
- This is the first UEFA competition match between these two teams.
- Celtic have won 19 and drawn two of their last 21 home matches in all competitions.
- Celtic have won their last three home matches in the UEFA Champions League proper.
- Celtic have won three of their last five UEFA Champions League matches (D1 L1).
- None of Celtic’s last 41 UEFA competition home matches finished without a goal being scored. The last time was against Rosenborg in the UEFA Champions League third qualifying round in July 2017.
- Celtic have won three of their previous four UEFA competition matches at home against Belgian teams (L1). The loss was a 1-0 defeat against Anderlecht in their most recent such fixture, in the 2017/18 UEFA Champions League group stage.
- Club Brugge have won ten of their last 15 UEFA competition matches.
- Club Brugge have lost only four of their last 20 UEFA competition matches (W13 D3).
- Club Brugge have only failed to score in one of their last 20 UEFA competition matches.
- Club Brugge have kept five clean sheets in their last nine UEFA competition matches.
- Club Brugge have won seven of their last ten away matches in UEFA competition. Despite three defeats in the last five such fixtures.
Celtic vs Club Brugge Prediction
Celtic will use the likely electric atmosphere at Celtic Park to their advantage here and try to get off to a fast start with intense pressing led by the likes of Daizen Maeda and Kyogo Furuhashi. Club Brugge will likely fight fire with fire, too, given their attacking capabilities so this could end up being quite an entertaining encounter for the neutral. However, given their home advantage, siding with Celtic does still seem the way to go for this one.
Celtic vs Club Brugge Tip: Celtic to win & over 2.5 goals
