"It is one of the biggest challenges in the season and we need to go there and keep the run going," said Gary Caldwell ahead of Sunday's clash with Hearts in Edinburgh "It's always a great game and a good atmosphere and we will have to recover and be ready for it."
Central defender Caldwell thinks there is plenty of quality in the squad to cope with the recent spate of injuries, he said: "We have the squad to rotate and anyone who comes in seems to do the job as good, if not better, than the next person. We are playing good attacking football and scoring lots of goals and it's good to be a part of it."
Some will be more fortunate than others in the recovery stakes. Glenn Loovens and Shunsuke Nakamura join the list of patients in the Celtic treatment room with Loovens expected to be out for at least two weeks with a thigh problem. Naka says that referee Craig Thomson's refusal to protect him from the Kilmarnock thugs during Wednesday night's game at Rugby Park (sic) means that he might miss Sunday's clash and worse still is the prospect that he may not recover in time to face Manchester United in Wednesday's crucial Champions League encounter.
Nakamura spoke yesterday about the incident, the pain he's in at the moment and his chances of recovering for the upcoming games. "I complained to the referee because he should have protected me and the other Celtic players from the bad fouls which were being committed by their players." said Shunsuke "That's why I made a signal to the referee rather than my opponent because I wanted to protest about the bad tackles and dangerous challenges."
"My left thigh is aching" said Naka "and I can't even stand up without holding on to something at the moment. I'm in a lot of pain right now, so we can only wait and see how I improve."
The Japanese maestro revealed that he'd asked to be substituted at half time "I was kicked on my left knee and had some pain, so I asked the manager to substitute me." he said "but I was happy to score and make a contribution to the team's success, although I didn't think my free-kick was perfect.'
Nakamura was already playing through the pain barrier and had his ankle heavily strapped before starting the match in Ayrshire. "I want as much time as possible to recover so I can give myself every chance of playing against Manchester United but I don't think I will be able to play on Sunday."
Jim Jefferies attempted to justify the brutality of his cloggers "We said to our players before the game "get in there" - as I think any manager would do. It was a cup-tie and we are not going to sit around and wait for Nakamura to tear us apart. We got stuck in and he has got to deal with that. There weren't many fouls given against him." said Jefferies unwittingly backing Naka's claim that the referee was incompetent
"I thought Gavin Skelton came on and let them know he was there. There is nothing wrong with that." continued Mr Total Football "I'm sure Gordon Strachan would look at Gary Caldwell in the opening spell and see that he was quite fortunate to get away with some tackles. That's because it's part and parcel of the game." he said in a whataboutery way.