Celtic’s Christopher Jullien will embrace challenge of trying to win quintet treble

French defender admits he will need to focus to avoid a difficult second season in Scotland

Celtic goalkeeper Scott Bain is likely to get the nod to start against Hamilton. Picture: Alan Harvey/SNS

There was a chuckle from Christopher Jullien the other day when it was put to the Celtic defender that there is a more notable achievement on offer for his club this season than the fabled 
ten-in-a-row. For all the suffocating obsession with that landmark.

The economic muscle the Scottish champions can currently flex over all others in the country – including Rangers – means by rights they should win the championship. What they shouldn’t be able to do is knock off treble after treble. Yet that extraordinary feat is open to them in a campaign that starts for Neil Lennon’s men this afternoon with their Premiership curtain-raiser at home to Hamilton Accies. From the outstet, the next ten months provide them with the opportunity not just to complete a quadruple treble – courtesy of the Scottish Cup conclusion held over because of the Covid-19 curtailment of last season – but run that into a quintet treble.

There have been ten ten-in-a-rows in the annals of European football. There has never been a quintet treble; never has a club been able to string together 45 cup tie victories during a period when they have kept snaffling their title. Lennon has conceded it will be the tallest of orders to take their sequence of straight domestic honours from an unprecedented 11 to the 15 mark. Jullien, meanwhile, appears to embrace the challenge.

Celtic's Christopher Jullien is put through his paces ahead of the Premiership opener against Hamilton Accies. Picture: Alan Harvey/SNS Group

“That would be the best and I’d welcome it,” said the French central defender Celtic bought from Toulouse for £7 million last summer. “Since I arrived here I’ve seen the mentality of every player and the club. We’re going to perform and try to win every game we can. We have the quality in the team to be good on the field.

“When I arrived I said it would be really difficult for me because I’m arriving into a team that had won everything. I had to show what I could bring to the club and the team. They helped me relax on the field and made me really comfortable. We had a great year and now I can’t wait to see how the new season goes.”

Jullien accepts in this pandemic age that has had to excise the spectators from a spectator sport “everything now is different: the stadium, the fans and now it is the transfer market [in running to October]. We have to deal with it. We know it is not going to be like this every year but we have to get through it with empty stadiums. Me, I am just locked-in in my head.”

The partnership Jullien established with Kristoffer Ajer was crucial to Celtic’s success last season. The 27-year-old has fingers crossed that the Norwegian will lock-in to another season in Scotland – despite reports linking AC Milan and Leicester City with interest in him. And is bracing himself for the difficult second season no matter who is alongside him.

“When you play in the team you always want the best players with you and Kris is part of the team,” said Jullien. “He has been here a long time and is a big, big player for us. I am here and I wish all players could stay with me but some will have good quality, like Kris. He will have some unbelievable club on his back for sure, for years and years. But now I just hope that he will stay with me for the longest that he can.

“Since I arrived my relationship with him has always been good and we try to keep that at the same level every day. We do our best to improve every day, to be better every day. I think the season is going to be more different because now I know everyone, on the field and in the staff. I know the league and I know my opponents.

“But they know me, too, so it will be different and it will be harder too. Sometimes when you know everything you can cheat a little bit so I don’t want to get in that mood. I want to double and treble my focus so I can do better than last year.”

The Celtic defence will be altered even if Ajer does remain, courtesy of Vasilis Barkas being recruited this week in a £5.5m deal from AEK Athens to fill the void created by the loss of Fraser Forster. The Celtic manager has said the upheaval endured by the Greek in recent days is likely to see him leave Scott Bain, pictured, in goal today. Jullien believes that the club’s support should be fair with Barkas when he does take his place in the team and avoid measuring him against Forster.

“I don’t think it’s good to compare him with Fraser,” he said. “You know, the club and Glasgow knows what Fraser did last year. He is the best goalkeeper I’ve had at my back but comparing the new goalkeeper with Fraser is a mistake. He has his qualities and so does Fraser.”

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