Callum McGregor expects to be in a game tomorrow night at Celtic prepare for their second out of three successive games against Motherwell.

The Parkhead side claimed a 2-0 win over the Fir Park side at the weekend as they enjoyed a successful defence of the Betfred League Cup, but the ill-feeling over the penalty award will still be simmering amongst the Lanarkshire side.

Scott Sinclair was insistent in the aftermath of the incident that he was fouled in box in the build-up to Celtic’s second goal, a flashpoint that has been poured over in the days that have followed.

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Lost amongst the background noise is that the Parkhead side rarely looked under any serious threat – a close range Louis Moult header which was palmed away by Craig Gordon was the closest Motherwell came to breaching Celtic – but McGregor has admitted that he expects a response tomorrow night.

“It will be hard at Fir Park,” he said. “For large parts of the game they gave us a tough time and I know they felt a bit hard done by at the penalty decision.

“I thought it was the right call – there was a definite tug of Scott – but I am sure that they’ll want to have something to say about it at Fir Park tomorrow night. It wasn’t a munching tackle or anything like that but to be fair there was contact. It was one v one and there was contact so by the letter of the law it was a penalty.

“You want to go through and put the ball in the back of the net but if you feel that there has been contact then it does impede you.

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“We know from experience that Fir Park is always a hard place to go.

“But we have had to dig out games but I think that comes from teams being desperate to beat us. We have stretched the record now to 65 games and everyone wants to be the team that ends it. They give it that wee bit extra against us and we know that we have to lift it at times.”

McGregor himself has grown over the last few months to prove to be a pivotal part of Brendan Rodgers’ squad.

Another product of the club’s youth academy, McGregor’s performance in the middle of the park finally earned him international recognition while he has also started a run of games lately for Celtic.

Having pushed himself into that position he is in no mood to relinquish his starting jersey, no matter the fraught nature of the weeks that lie between now and the festive period for Celtic.

Midweek and weekend games will see Celtic fight a four-pronged European and domestic campaign before the respite of the winter break looms.

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For McGregor, though, the chance to keep the momentum going is key.

“I feel good,” he said. “I feel full of energy and I don’t want to give my place up in the team. I have had a wee run at it and you always feel that if you get that then you get up a bit of momentum. It becomes a mindset that you are fresh and ready to go for every game.

“My confidence is there and like everyone, I just want to stay in the team.

“There are a lot of games between now and right over the festive period. There were boys on the bench at Hampden that could have started the game for us on Sunday and you’ll see over the next six weeks or so that the manager will rotate it in order to keep it fresh and keep us going.

“But I don’t think you’ll see anyone sticking their hand up for a rest.”

Last season the Betfred League Cup proved to be the catalyst for Celtic to kick on and lay the foundations of the Treble winning, Invincible season.

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Having successfully defended the Cup, McGregor believes that it will have a similar impact again – and the midfielder also believes that there is more to come from Celtic this season.

“I think it will give us a wee kick on again,” he said. “Our first trophy was massive for us last year and I think it will be the same again this term. We had to really dig deep at times over the season to get draws and victories and I think it just shows that we aren’t ready to take our foot off any time soon.

“I don’t think you ever get tired of winning.

“We have put the first trophy available to us in the cabinet again and we just want to keep going, keep trying to push for another level.

“It is a bit of a strange week given that we are playing Motherwell three times on the bounce. It happened a few years back when we had a similar situation with Dundee United. It can feel a bit odd but you just have to take each game individually and get on with it.

“It might sound boring but we are always just looking to get to the next game and produce a level of performance that we are satisfied with. We won’t be looking to take it easy any time soon, that’s for sure.”