Martin O’Neill has praised Shim Mheuka after the young striker impressed again during Celtic’s 2-1 win over St Mirren in Paisley.
He thought he had scored his first Celtic goal in stoppage time after beating Jacob Chapman, only for VAR to rule the effort out for offside.
The decision denied Mheuka a memorable moment, but O’Neill was clearly pleased with what he saw.
Speaking to BBC Sport after the match, the Celtic manager said: “He’s very, very good. He’s been exceptional in training.
“And the little cameo roles that he’s had, he’s done brilliantly.”
That is strong praise for a player still settling into the squad after arriving late in the summer window.
Mheuka has not yet been asked to carry a major load in attack, with Duran leading the line and Kasper Hogh also part of O’Neill’s plans when fit, but the teenager has already started to show why Celtic moved to bring him in.
O’Neill also made it clear that he expects more opportunities to come.
“He’ll come again,” he said.
For a young forward trying to force his way into the side, those comments point to genuine trust from the Irishman rather than simple praise after a brief substitute appearance.
Mheuka now has another useful cameo behind him, and with Celtic facing a busy run of fixtures, his chances to add to those minutes should continue to come.
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2 responses
Offside my eye! That was a disgraceful and embarrassing call from a match official hell-bent on trying to prevent the Champions taking the three points!
That’s not to take ANYTHING away from a strong and resilient St. Mirren side. But Celtic were still blatantly robbed of two 100% perfectly legit goals. Even their penalty appeared to be outside the box! But maybe I can give them that!
when was the last time celtic scored in a game without waiting for var ok well scales today but then you wait for some other incident at start of move O’Neil right but how many goals would Celtic not get if it was left up to officails look at Wednesday game linesman had flag up early it could have stopped player scoring this linesman has history with Celtic and not a very hood one