St Johnstone defender David McCracken should not be too fazed by Celtic’s attacking armoury, as the last time he visited Parkhead he was coming up against Henrik Larsson.
“I definitely believe there’s goals in this team. It will come. It’s the job of the media to keep bringing it up and it will keep running until we go on a goal-scoring spree. Then it will get forgotten about.
“To us it isn’t a problem just now. We want to get points on the board and I’d be more worried if we weren’t creating chances.”
When McCracken decided to return to Scotland from England, the opportunity of playing in matches like tomorrow’s helped persuade him.
He said: “It was a number of factors that brought me back north and that was one of them.
“I’d spent four years down south, which was what I wanted. I was keen to get away from Scotland at the time and to try something different.
“We’d planned to come back north next year when my contract ran out with Brentford but there were changes with the manager there and I’m back a year earlier, which I’m happy about.”
Midfielders Chris Millar and Kevin Moon are out injured but Callum Davidson should return.
Scott Brown is a doubt for Celtic after struggling through the Europa League clash with Sion with an ankle injury and will be monitored.
Defender Kelvin Wilson is also very doubtful, while Glenn Loovens (hamstring), Beram Kayal (ankle) and Gary Hooper (ankle) are still out.
The veteran centre-back was a Dundee United player when he had to try to nullify the Swede and his international team-mates, John Hartson and Chris Sutton.
The experience should stand him in good stead for the examination he and his fellow Perth defenders are sure to get from the present day Hoops strikeforce tomorrow afternoon.
McCracken said: “I’ve got good and bad memories of my games at Celtic Park with United.
“A lot of the time it was damage limitation when you went there but I think that’s changed in the last two or three years.
“Teams go there now with a more positive attitude thinking they can get something out of the game. Even though they’re on fire just now we have to assert ourselves on the match.
“You can’t be negative going into the match, and that’s how the gaffer likes to approach matches.
“Previously I was up against the likes of Larsson, Sutton and Hartson. That was as big a challenge as you could get. I was a young player and it was great to face guys like that.
“Larsson was a magnificent player and it’s fair to say he’s probably the best I’ve come up against.
“It’s changed days and Celtic don’t have the same spending power but you can still see the quality’s there.”
McCracken made an impressive debut against Dunfermline last week but he does not look back on the match with great fondness.
He said: “It was disappointing for myself and the team to lose my first game.
“It was a home game and we’re wanting to win as many of them as possible, especially against the teams expected to be in the bottom half of the table. Somewhere along the line we’re going to have to pick up those points.
“As a defender you want to keep clean sheets and considering the way we played it was very disappointing to concede a goal.
“At the other end, it’s not just about the strikers we all have to take responsibility to score goals.
Continued…