FORMER Everton and

Sunderland star Bryan Oviedo admits he’ll find it hard to gun down Celtic this week because the FC Copenhagen midfielder supports the club.

The Danes suffered a shock defeat on Friday night in their final game before they face Celtic in the Last 32 of the Europa League when they crashed to a 1-0 loss at lowly-placed Esbjerg.

Stale Solbakken’s side looked rusty as they returned from a two-month winter break and could have lost by more with the hosts missing a penalty and hitting the bar.

Costa Rican defender Oviedo knows his colleagues will need to raise their game when they welcome Neil Lennon’s men to the Parken Stadium on

Thursday. And the tie will be special for the 29-year-old

because he used to follow

Celtic when international

colleague Cristian Gamboa was at Celtic.

He said: “Celtic are a really good team. In fact, I used to support them because a really good friend of mine, Cristian Gamboa, used to play for them.

“They are a really strong team and it is going to be a huge test for us on Thursday.

“And I was a team-mate of Aiden McGeady at Sunderland and at Everton. I played with him for many years. He’s a great player and of course is a big Celtic fan, too, so I certainly know all about Celtic.”

And the 52-time capped player knows Copenhagen will need to improve for the visit of the Scottish champions this week.

He said: “We need to pick ourselves up as soon as possible because Thursday is a really important game for us.”