RONNY DEILA today backed James Forrest to bounce back from his horrific late miss against St Johnstone in Perth.

The winger scorned a glorious opportunity to snatch all three points for Celtic in the latter stages after the Parkhead side had found themselves under the cosh for large parts of the goalless draw against Tommy Wright's Saints.

Forrest rounded keeper Alan Mannus only to then screw his shot wide with the empty goal gaping. It was a shocking miss, but Deila was quick to leap to the defence of the Scotland internationalist and point the finger at the bumpy McDiarmid Park surface.

"He was disappointed, of course. You can see the bounce-up, so what can you do? You could grow potatoes out there, that was how the pitch was. Strange things will happen on a surface like that and that was a strange thing."

The Hoops boss was less defensive of his backline, however.

Virgil van Dijk was rested for the game against St Johnstone, with Efe Ambrose one of six changes that was made to the team.

Had it not been for the form of stand-in keeper Lukasz Zaluska, Celtic could well have found themselves victims of a defeat such was the manner in which Saints pressed for the victory - and repeatedly created chances.

"It is a miracle that it was 0-0. It was a crazy game," he said. "Defensively, we were everywhere. It was too open for my taste.

"It was a very offensive team that we put out. We had Stuart [Armstrong] in the midfield, two real wingers and Kris [Commons] is also very offensive.

"They played very directly and we were stretched a lot in the defence. We didn't push enough from behind and you get trouble.

"It was maybe fun to watch from the stand, but defensively, it wasn't the best from us."

Despite the fact that it made for difficult viewing at times for Celtic, Deila was adamant there were plenty of positives for him to take from the 90 minutes.

The biggest, of course, was the return of Charlie Mulgrew, who played for the first time this year.

Mulgrew has not featured since the beginning of December, and his return will be a welcome boost for Deila, who already has one eye on the Uefa Champions League qualifiers.

"It was not our best performance, but Lukasz [Zaluska] did a very good job. I am happy with that. I am happy with James [Forrest] offensively because he is creating chances which is very good, while Kieran Tierney came through the game well and Charlie Mulgrew is back, and this is all positive."

And Deila remains insistent that Van Dijk has not told him he wishes to quit the club this summer.

"I hope that he will still be here. I talk with him every day and he has not told me anything different," said the manager.