I have my doubts that Aston Villa was ever a goer for Brendan Rodgers.

It would appear that he was never approached for the role but also, even if he had been, I suspect he would have viewed it as just too big a risk. Villa need someone to go in and taken them straight back into the Premier League and failure to do that would have left him a little isolated.

In terms of the bigger picture, I still think that Celtic have a higher profile than many teams of Villa’s ilk.

But what Rodgers will appreciate is that no matter how disparaging people may look across the border and snub their nose at Scottish football, there will always be currency to be gained from getting results in a European context.

Doing the business against teams on the continent will always make people sit up and take notice.

Aside from that there will also be an appetite from Celtic to go and be successful in that environment given the history of the club.