Brendan Rodgers has re-opened the door to James Forrest at Celtic Park.

The 25-year-old turned down the club's final contract offer in January, with former manager Ronny Deila claiming at the time that there would not be another offer put to the player who is out of contract in January.

Rodgers, though, has insisted that Forrest has intimidated that he wishes to remain with club and believes that a deal can be done to keep the player at Celtic.

Forrest netted the opening goal yesterday after just 8 minutes and the Celtic boss looks to be getting the best out of a player who has struggled for form over the last two seasons.

“He wants to stay," said Rodgers. "I said to him when I first came in that I thought he’d been on loan for two seasons.

"I wondered where he was. I remember down in England watching him and I saw this young player who I thought was a real talent, fast, dynamic, could get at people, and for whatever reason it hadn’t worked out for him in the last couple of seasons. I had a joke with him that I’d like to see James Forrest back here because the guy who was here was away on loan for a couple of years.

“Since pre-season he has been absolutely first class. He’s starting to understand that he has to press the game and be aggressive and you saw that a couple of times today. And as a winger he has to create and score goals and he created the opportunity with good skill in the first part and it was a wonderful finish. I have been delighted. He wants to stay, he pulled me in Slovenia and said he was enjoying the work and he feels an important part of the squad would like to stay. So it’s between the agent and the club now to arrange that.”

Scott Brown, the Celtic captain, also voiced his optimism that Forrest will have a u-turn on where he sees his future."

"I think everyone sees his qualities," said Brown. "He can go down the line, he can come inside, and he can even score now! The gaffer was saying that there could be a great contest between me and him for seeing who is going to score the most this season. He was asking on the bus if he had scored at Tynecastle and I think he got his answer."