CELTIC will go into their next Europa League group game against Bayer Leverkusen on Thursday night without star striker Kyogo Furuhashi. They will also almost certainly be without captain Callum McGregor. Off the back of a patchy run of form that has yielded just two wins in their last seven in all competitions – home victories over Ross County and Raith Rovers – some supporters may subsequently feel they are going into the tie with little hope.

But Joao Jota disagrees. There is of course the X-factor of a packed Celtic Park on a European night to factor in their favour, but the winger thinks that Celtic will also have more than enough talent on the park to hold their own against the Bundesliga outfit,

“Everyone in the squad is ready for the game,” said Jota. “Whoever goes to the pitch will have enough quality to play the game and to fight for the victory.

“We will be ready, for sure, with the ones we have and we will enjoy it.

“Every player at Celtic is important – not just Callum and Kyogo. We are all part of the team.

“I really want everyone to be fit so everyone can help the team. It’s a long process and a long season. We need everyone to be available to helps us win the games and to bring glory to the club. We are just waiting for everyone to be fit but that’s not the main focus right now.

“We just need to focus on the game and be ready.”

There may be some method in Jota’s musings. When the teamsheet was released ahead of the opening Group F game against Real Betis in Seville, few would have given Ange Postecoglou’s depleted side a prayer.

The frenzied home crowd were startled though as Celtic turned on the style in the early stages, cutting the Betis defence open at will and racing into a 2-0 lead.

Jota himself passed up a great opportunity to make it three, Claudio Bravo managing to save his effort when through on the keeper, and ultimately Celtic wilted as the hosts roared back to eventually win 4-3.

There were of course positives and negatives to take from such a topsy-turvy performance, with the exciting attacking play rather tempered by the now familiarly porous looking backline, but perhaps the most notable aspect of the night from a Celtic point of view was how well they held their own in such esteemed company.

If they can learn the lessons from that night and tighten up defensively – a big if, admittedly – then Jota believes the experience may have been invaluable.

“We’ve been trying to fix the things we did wrong against Real Betis and we will try to do better on Thursday,” he said.

“Hopefully we can get the win as it’s something we really want. We want to do good on this European stage. We will be ready for it.

“It was very good to be winning 2-0 at such an early stage of the game [against Real Betis] but we have to learn from the errors we made as we wanted to get the victory and we didn’t. Now we are looking to fix that. Hopefully we can get the win.

“I think every test in Europe is difficult as there are plenty of quality teams and the level is very high in the Europa League.

“We will try to do our best. We will stick with our plans, be a family on the pitch and work our hardest to get the win.

“They have their strengths and we have ours. We need to eliminate their strengths and be ready for everything in the game.

“They might be good at some things but we will try to be better at other things so we can win the game.”

A rub of the green here and there probably wouldn’t go amiss either. Celtic manager Postecoglou was cursing his luck last week regarding the injury list, but his poor fortune extended onto the pitch on Sunday, when Jota cracked the bar and his team did so three times in total in the 1-1 draw against Dundee United.

But Jota doesn’t want to fall into the trap of blaming fickle fate for Celtic’s recent struggles, instead preferring to extol the virtues of keeping the faith in the long game being played by Postecoglou.

“I’m very good friends of the woodwork,” he said wryly. “On another day we could have won that game comfortably.

“Unfortunately we didn’t get the win. We hit the crossbar three times which is a record this season for sure.

“But the process is there. The ideas are there. The intensity to win the game is there.

“This is a long process. We just have to believe in our ideas and keep on working. Things will be good in the future.”

*The Celtic FC Foundation’s Football for Good Fund – set up in response to the COVID-19 pandemic – has now raised £1.5m. The money will help those facing food and fuel poverty and provide mental health support to those who need it most in Scotland, Ireland, the wider UK, and overseas.