Anthony Ralston reflects on his first start since January

The 27-year-old was handed his 19th start of the season in Saturday’s 1-0 victory over St Mirren, stepping in after Colby Donovan – who had been filling the role – joined fellow defenders Alistair Johnston and Julian Araujo on the injury list.

The Scotland international hopeful now finds himself in a crucial position and is determined to make the most of an extended run in the side with five games remaining in the league.

Speaking via Daily Record, Ralston said: “It was good to be involved. I’m experienced enough now to know that when you are out of the fold and not getting as much game time as you’d want, that every day in training you go in and do yourself justice.

“You never know when you’ll be needed, so it’s important that I have been doing that because I’ve been able to last the 90 minutes and I felt good. That comes naturally to me as you are only letting yourself down at the end of the day if you don’t put the work in.

“You need to be professional as when the management and the team call upon you, you don’t want to let them down. You don’t want to let yourself down or the people who have supported you.”

Ralston added: “You can’t just replicate Premiership game tempo with training. You can play eleven v eleven but it’s very hard to replicate actual games and that intensity and what you are asked to do, especially as a Celtic player.”

“You just need to get your head down and grind through it which I felt I managed to do. There is no secret in terms of how you naturally feel as a footballer, it’s the same for everyone, nobody would say they are happy when they are not playing, they can’t be satisfied.”

“Everyone wants to play and this is my club, this is the place I have been since I was a boy, so I am never going to let anybody down and I’m going to keep doing the work to make sure I am ready to go. The only thing I can do is go on the training pitch and the pitch here and put my all into it. Then I need to make sure I can get the reward for it.”

“It’s worthwhile going through the hard times but we are now at the tail end of the season and everyone needs to have a great attitude. We need to get the work done and put it into the games now.”

It remains uncertain if Johnston will feature again before the campaign concludes, but Ralston insists that whoever is selected at right-back will be fully backed by a collective team-first mentality.

The 27 year-old said: “The competition is definitely strong and that’s not taking anything away from any of the other boys as we all support each other.”

“Alistair is coming back to fitness and that will be a great boost for the team as he’s a great player. It’s purely about professionalism and that’s what we all need to have.”

Conor Spence

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