Martin O'Neill knows he and his side must avoid repeating an unwanted record. Celtic are now on a run of three straight defeats across all competitions, and that means they are one defeat away from repeating the Wilfried Nancy run of four straight defeats, which was the worst since 1978.
Nancy paid the price shortly after, and O'Neill will not get such a short leash, but he certainly doesn't want that record on his ledger, and an away date with eighth-place Motherwell should not mean his side equal that record.
But no one is to be taken lightly, and O'Neill knows it. "I think they only have to look at what happened last season," he told CelticPlayer. "That we are capable of coming from behind to win.
"This is the point. It is early. They would have seen some of these things before. It seemed a real, I’m not saying an overreaction to what happened in the week, but it was something that they will have experienced in the past.
"Sometimes we overcome it. Other times we’ve maybe allowed it to drift, I don’t know. All I can say is that the determination there within the team, something hopefully that I can control, is there. It’s there in abundance.
"I don’t think it ever leaves you. It gets layered away a little bit at times, but then you have to come roaring back and really, really go for it. And that’s what we’re going to do."
Celtic can't afford a further slide
Celtic were sent into a state of panic with their three straight defeats before the break. Another repeat of that kind of form is going to be a big problem, and it's very much on the cards.
Why? The Bhoys have a winnable game against Motherwell, but they then face Benfica, Hearts and Celta Vigo in a particularly difficult run of games. O'Neill and his men are going to need to find two or three wins from those four games to avoid the concern growing.
Crucially, there are some key issues to prevent that from happening, and one would hope the last three weeks have given O'Neill chance to work out solutions. If he has failed to find sufficient solutions, then he is likely to find himself back under pressure and perhaps back reconsidering his future after another torrid run of form.
This tricky fixture list has come at a tough time for O'Neill and co.
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