THERE were a number of first-choice players missing from the Celtic starting line-up last night, but the most high-profile absentee at Parkhead was manager Neil Lennon as he ran the rule over Champions League qualifying opponents HJK Helsinki.

With the focus firmly on reaching the group stage of the competition for the first time in four years, it made far more sense for Lennon to spend the evening in Iceland paying close attention to what his team are likely to encounter at Celtic Park a week tonight.

Having thrashed KR Reykjavik 7-0 in the first leg of their second qualifying round clash, the Celtic boss embarked on his European trip safe in the knowledge it would be the Finnish champions who would be standing between his team and the money-spinning group stage.

At the same time, Helsinki deployed their assistant manager Juho Rantala to Glasgow to see what he could learn about Celtic as they lost 1-0 to Norwich City.

This season, perhaps more than any other, it is vitally important Celtic find themselves competing in Europe's premier tournament.

Financially, it could be the difference between bringing in a new face to improve his team as opposed to having to sell a couple to balance the books as a result of the Rangers newco being banished to the Third Division and therefore impacting on their Old Firm rival's earning capacity.

But, more importantly, Celtic need Champions League participation for pure football reasons.

With no Old Firm showdowns to relish, and the competitive edge in the championship race likely to be missing, European nights can provide the SPL champions and their supporters with an injection of some excitement.

Lennon, of course, desperately wants to lead his team into the group stage after requiring the benefit of a red- tape controversy to earn a place in the group stage of the Europa League at the expense of FC Sion, who had defeated them in the qualifying stage prior to being thrown out the competition in disgrace.

Although pre-season results will not have particularly pleased him – especially the 4-0 drubbing at the hands of Dutch side Ajax over the weekend – he can point out he hasn't once deployed what he would considered to be his strongest starting line-up.

And that was the case once again last night as Johan Mjallby took charge of the team in his absence for the visit of the Canaries.

The starting line-up was completely different to what the Celtic supporters can expect next week with their Champions League ambitions on the line with, perhaps, Thomas Rogne, Emilio Izaguirre, Kris Commons and Georgios Samaras likely to be the only survivors.

"The team which starts against Inter Milan on Saturday will be closer to the team that will start next week when we play HJK Helsinki," said Mjallby.

"We have had to give everyone game time, but we'll now begin to properly prepare for that match.

"I was pleased with the way we kept possession against Norwich, and I think we were unlucky to lose.

"The players have been training hard and there were some heavy legs out there at the end.

"For me, the results in pre-season aren't hugely important. It's about preparing for the new season and we are getting better with every training session and match.

"We'll now ease off with the physical training the players are given as we revert to our normal preparations for matches.

"Everyone is aware of how important the Champions League qualifying matches are and, hopefully, we can pick up a good result, qualify for the play-off stage and then the group stage itself."

It took some time for this friendly to get going and, somewhat predictably, a former Rangers player provided the spark. Norwich's summer signing Steven Whittaker was roundly booed at every turn before the Scotland inter- nationalist hobbled off after just 22 minutes.

Immediately afterwards, the home side came extremely close to opening the scoring when they were denied by the crossbar twice in the space of a couple of minutes.

Commons' 30-yard shot was deflected on to the bar and he picked up possession less than a minute later and found Mikael Lustig's run into the pen-alty area and the Swede was unlucky as his header came back off the woodwork.

Kelvin Wilson then limped off and was replaced by Victor Wanyama. Celtic were forced to make another change just before the interval when Lucasz Zaluska went off with a head gash and was replaced by Fraser Forster.

Samaras then blew a great chance to put his side ahead after the interval after being brilliantly picked out by Paddy McCourt in a game where Celtic were dominating possession but looking anything but sharp in the final third.

Both sides made a number of changes, with Celtic bringing on Gary Hooper, Adam Matthews and James Forrest.

In the end, and against the run of play, it was Norwich who conjured up the only goal of the night in the 89th minute when Forster could only block Bradley Johnston's shot with his leg and Grant Holt was on hand to tap the ball into the empty net.