Brendan Rodgers believes there were sufficient positives to take from Celtic’s defeat to Leipzig last night in the Europa League to believe that the Parkhead side can beat them in Glasgow.

The Bundesliga side travel to Celtic in just under a fortnight in a game that will be definitive to Rodgers’ ambitions of making it into the knockout stages of Europe’s second tier competition.

And despite the 2-0 defeat to the Germans last night, Rodgers is optimistic that Celtic still have a fighting chance of making it out of the Group B.

“It is going to be critical when we play Leipzig in the next game,” he said. “We have to be looking to win that game and I think we have seen enough to feel we can do that. They are a good side but I felt some of the calmness in the play and some of the quality in the play was very good.

“I have seen enough from the game and we need to win the next game to give us any chance of qualification.

“I thought we had much more personality in our game. We were playing against a good side and they are a tough team but I have seen enough tonight to think that in the second leg we have a good chance of getting a good result there and we will have some players back then.”

Celtic were undone last night with two goals inside a chaotic three-minute spell in the opening period but Rodgers has maintained that there was more life about his side than there has been in other away defeats.

The stats make for grim reading – Celtic have lost 31 group games in Europe from 44 encounters and won just two – but Rodgers believes had the Parkhead side converted two good chances then the complexion of the tie would have changed significantly.

“We started the game really well,” he said. “We had a chance after just seven minutes that at this level you want to be taking. But I thought we were in good control of the game and we were giving them problems with our shape.

“We had a great chance late on with Olivier [Ntcham] bursting through and if we get that then it leaves an interesting last five, ten minutes.

“The two goals came quickly. When you make those slight mistakes and there is misjudgement on a cross the you get punished because there are a good team. That is just something that is continual work. It is continuing analysis of it. You don’t get frustrated, you have to learn from this level.

“But I am proud of the team and the way they imposed their way in the game. We created a few chances that we would want to take at this level. If you don’t, you get punished.”

James Forrest missed the game because of suspension while Tom Rogic, Filip Benkovic, Leigh Griffiths, Kristoffer Ajer and and Scott Brown missed out because of injury. That meant a starting jersey for Cristian Gamboa, Jozo Simunovic, Eboue Kouassi, Ryan Christie and Lewis Morgan.

“Young Lewis up front alongside Edouard had a couple of good moments in the first-half,” said the celtic manager. “He did very well. We had to change him slightly in the second-half but he did very well. Kouassi came in and made tackles and got on the ball and tried to get us playing forward.

“Ryan Christie was also very good and worked hard. For a lot of the guys coming in having not played, sometimes they take that extra touch on the ball that you won’t get at this level.

“But that goes across the whole team. I thought we needed to play a lot quicker at times but that is something that comes with experiences. The guys who came in gave us everything and they will be better for it.”

Simunovic had to go off after picking landing awkwardly and is a doubt for the weekend League Cup game against Hearts, while Dedryck Boyata is suspended for that one.

“It looks like he is struggling,” said Rodgers. “It’s another injury but we’ll find out in the next couple of days.”