Elena Sadiku aspires to be Celtic’s Queen of Queens – here’s how it can happen…
Elena Sadiku, after a difficult start to her new job as Celtic FC Women’s Head Coach, has certainly turned things around. She has her team playing high octane, intense football that few sides can live with in the women’s game North of the Border, and her Celtic side is now scoring for fun.
Celtic at sixes and sevens
Last weekend Partick Thistle conceded 7 goals against Elena’s Ghirls and yesterday the Montrose keeper had to pick the ball out of her net on half a dozen occasions.
This evening Sadiku will learn her side’s opponents in the Women’s Scottish Cup semi-final and the remaining SWPL1 fixtures are now all post split, with the top six playing each other home and away. The quality, the excitement and the controversy goes up significantly and it would be a much better system for the men’s game look at.
“We keep scoring goals”
“We are happy about going through to the semi-finals. We didn’t concede any goals, and we keep scoring goals,” Sadiku told Celtic TV before making the long trip down the road from Montrose.
“Standing here now, obviously I want more goals but the most important thing is that we are through to the semi-final and its mission accomplished. I think it also comes from us being ready right from the start. We always talk about the fact that we need to be ready from the start.
Playing for the fans
“We had a job to do for the fans travelling to Montrose to make sure that we show how much we want it, for us but also playing for the fans.”
Celtic have won the Scottish Cup in both 2022 and 2023 beating Glasgow City 3-2 in a memorable match at Tynecastle then easily taking care of theRangers last season at Hampden, the new home for the Women’s Scottish Cup semi-finals and finals.
Funny that
Fran Alonso led Celtic to this two trophy wins plus a League Cup triumph on top but never quite got the team over the line in the SWPL1. Two runners up finishes that went to the last day were both agonising and on both occasions theRangers losing to Glasgow City cost Celtic the title. Funny that.
Queen of Queens
If Sadiku can get Celtic over the line to win the league for the first time in the club’s history and can add a third consecutive Scottish Cup on top then she’ll be able to write herself into Celtic’s history.
When the Swedish coach arrived at Celtic as Alonso’s replacement she referenced Henrik Larsson and knew all about what the King of Kings achieved at Celtic. Maybe she said, she’d one day be known as the Queen of Queens.
That could happen sooner than you ever thought possible Elena. You know what you have to do.
*PHOTOS FROM YESTERDAY’S MATCH AT MONTROSE.
