FIRST and foremost, Celtic’s initial aim for going into the Champions League should simply be to qualify for the group stages. Anything beyond that is a bonus.

The route through the qualifiers is so hard and so arduous. They have eight games before they can get there, and a lot of the clubs they will potentially be playing are half-way through their seasons. They are up and running, while Celtic have had one or two bounce games and have only been back a couple of weeks.

It can be very, very difficult, it really can, so they have to take it one step at a time, negotiate each qualifier and see where that takes them.

Read more: Celtic will want to avoid making the news cycles for all the wrong reasons in Armenia

They will need some big performances and some big wins at home. Celtic have shown that they can compete against teams at almost any level at home, and hopefully if they can negotiate these qualifiers so that the excitement can really begin.

Having those three home games guaranteed is so vital to the feel-good factor around Celtic, because it is a long winter without any of those electric European nights at Celtic Park to look forward to.

Read more: John Hartson: Celtic can't play all of their strikers, but two out of three ain't bad

After that, who knows? Brendan will want to get Celtic into the knockout stages as his predecessors Neil Lennon and Martin O’Neill did. Going for 10 in-a-row is obviously so important to the club and the fans, and I completely get that, but I also feel that Brendan wants to achieve things in Europe after some of the drubbings Celtic have had over the last couple of years under him.