Celtic captain Scott Brown insists best is still to come

It was a difficult season for the Hoops captain who struggled with tendonitis throughout the campaign but the 30-year-old has insisted that he believes his best years are still ahead of him.

Brown was targeted by Joey Barton last week as the English midfielder claimed that the Scotland internationalist wasn’t “at his level”.

Read more: Alan Thompson: you need the Champions League to bring back the players

There have been some whispers that Brown is past his best after toiling with injuries, but the player himself is approaching the new campaign in a positive frame of mind as Celtic regroup for the opening day of pre-season at Lennoxtown this morning.

“Who says I am finished?” joked Brown. “I had a tough season with injury and I probably came back into the team a bit too early. But I wanted to play and help to try to get us to the title.

“I still feel really fit and strong but more than that, I still feel hungry. I want to get better, I want to work hard and, at 30, I feel as though I can still keep getting better and improving. I have as much energy and desire as I ever had.”

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Brown, meanwhile, has revealed that tuning into the European Championships this summer has made for painful viewing. Scotland finished fourth in Group C and were beaten to a play-off place by the Republic of Ireland, much to Brown’s frustration.

“I found it really hard, especially when you see the rest of the home nations away,” he said. “It is tough. It is difficult as a player to watch other countries there and not be at it.

“It is not something that I wanted to watch. It just underlines that you aren’t there.

“The games against Georgia hurt us but it isn’t ever easy to accept it, especially since it has been so long since we have been at a tournament. It gets harder and harder but it is up to us as a group to try and organise ourselves for the World Cup qualifiers in September.”

Brown, though, is well prepared for getting back to work this morning.

Celtic will discover who they are up against in their first European qualifier in mid-July, and Brown is ready to start the push to bring Champions League football back to Celtic.

“I feel ok and I will hopefully kick on now. I am looking forward to sunny old Lennoxtown again,” he said. “It will be good to see how we are going to train and what we are going to do. We are going for one manager to another so we can see what the differences are and what the qualities are as well. “He seems very positive in the way he wants to play,, quite relaxed with the lads and how we are going to be on the training ground so it will be a good balance for everyone.

“The squads will change but it will be good to get back training. You start to miss it. It is all about coming back it, doing our job and hopefully doing it as well as we can.

“We are all willing to learn. We all want the best and I think Brendan will bring that out in everyone.”

While Rodgers’ first remit will be to bring in players to help Celtic make it into the Champions League group stages, it remains to be seen if he can add Joe Gomez or Andre Wisdom.

A loan deal might be the most likely option – but that may well be dependent on Celtic making it into the group stages.