If there was a positive for Celtic to take from their trip to Fir Park yesterday afternoon it was the return of Patrick Roberts.

The winger’s season was heavily curtailed by back-to-back hamstring injuries and his appearance off the bench against Motherwell was his first outing for the first-team since November last year.

Ironically, it was at Fir Park on a midweek outing where Roberts sustained the injury that has kept him out for the last four months but the player is keen to make the most of the run-in for Celtic.

“It’s been tough,” he said. “It happened a couple of months ago and it has taken time to get fit again and now I have to regain the match sharpness I had before I got injured. That’s tough but I’ve worked hard with the physios to get to where I am.

“I’ve missed the magnitude of some of the games. That’s why I came here and to miss those games has been disappointing but that’s what happens when you get injured. You have to miss some games, so it’s all about working hard to get back fit and staying fit in now the task for me. I want to have a good end to the season and finish strong.

“It was nearly in [the chance he had that clipped the bar]. I’ve felt good in training the last few weeks and I knew I’d get on at some point. I was just to try to get a goal and we were trying our best but the bar got in the way!”

Celtic are currently ten points clear at the top of the table with a game in hand. While the Parkhead club are keen to play down the finale as they close in on a seventh consecutive title, there was a feeling in yesterday’s performance that the fact the league is all but done contributed to a lethargic display.

Roberts, though, is determined to make the most of the remaining games.

“There is always work to be done,” he said. “We’ll take each game as it comes, no matter who we play and try to win as many games as we can. That’s all we can do. What the other teams do takes care of itself and we just have to try to take three points from every game we play.

“We said that last year when we were so far ahead. At the end of the day, you’ve just got to go out and do it for ourselves. The league will take care of itself as long as we do our jobs and at the end of the season we’ll see how far ahead we are.”

And Roberts also maintained that he wasn’t apportioning blame as Scott Sinclair went for goal rather than pass to him as Celtic chased the game in the late stages.

“I think in his mind he thought he could score and if I was in the same situation I’d have gone for goal as well,” said the winger. “I think the defender has impeded him a little bit, but if he squares it I’ve got a tap-in, but like I say, I’d have taken the shot as well if I was through.”