Nancy will love him: Celtic may have another Callum McGregor in the making

If this is to be the end of Martin O’Neill’s brief return, what a way to sign off.

On Thursday night, Celtic ended a 16-match, four-year-long winless streak in European away games by beating Feyenoord 3-1 at De Kuip, coming back from a goal down to do so; Yang Hyun-jun, Reo Hatate and Benjamin Nygren all on target.

This means O’Neill has won five of six matches since being parachuted into the role following Brendan Rodgers‘ shock resignation.

The 73-year-old, alongside Shaun Maloney, is set to remain in charge when the Celts visit Easter Road to take on Hibernian on Sunday lunchtime, but there is optimism that Wilfried Nancy will take over soon, potentially in time for the visit of Dundee on Wednesday.

Once the Frenchman does swap Ohio for Glasgow, one of Celtic’s breakout stars from this season could well become a key figure, currently on course to replicate an active club legend.

Callum McGregor’s importance at Celtic

While players, managers and board members come and go, Callum McGregor remains a constant, the heartbeat in both the team and the club as a whole.

Thursday saw the captain make his 540th appearance for the club, starting 21 of 22 matches so far this season, accumulating 1,939 minutes out of a possible 2,040 so far (95%).

When Scott Brown departed in 2021, his leadership and all-around brilliance was supposed to be impossible to replace, but McGregor has transitioned into this role seamlessly, lifting 24 major trophies to date, and it is incomprehensible to imagine a Celtic side without him.

As well as winning back the ball and keeping the team ticking in possession, McGregor continues to produce key moments, lashing home a 95th-minute winner at St Mirren last Saturday night, having scored a similar rocket against Rangers in the League Cup semi-finals earlier this month.

Having joined the club as an eight-year-old, McGregor continues to set an example to all those in the Celtic academy dreaming of representing the first team one day, but who is currently on course to follow in his footsteps?

Celtic’s next academy star

Celtic have endured rotten luck in terms of injuries this season.

Cameron Carter-Vickers could be out for the rest of the season following achilles surgery, Jota remains sidelined after rupturing his ACL in April, while Alistair Johnston suffered a torn hamstring against Kairat in August, only to aggravate the issue 26 minutes into his return when Sturm Graz visited Parkhead.

With Johnston, who has been so excellent since joining the club, having started only five matches all season, most would have expected Anthony Ralston to deputise, but it appears as though Colby Donovan has leapfrogged him in the pecking order.

After featuring sporadically during pre-season, scoring against Cork City at Páirc Uí Chaoimh in July, the 19-year-old made his competitive senior debut against Livingston when Rodgers made wholesale changes in between the two legs against Kairat.

Well, since then, he hasn’t really looked back, starting just two Premiership matches, but included in the lineup for four of the five Europa League fixtures, these against Crvena zvezda, Braga, Sturm Graz and now Feyenoord, putting in an excellent display in Rotterdam.

The table below documents how well he has played in Europe so far.

As the table documents, Donovan has been excellent in the Europa League this season, contributing in a wide variety of ways.

The teenager ranks highly for all the in possession metrics, recording an assist for Liam Scales’ crucial equaliser against Sturm Graz, while only Arne Engels and Benjamin Nygren have created more big chances, ranked first in terms of goal-creating actions.

Given that incoming manager Nancy deploys a 3-4-2-1 formation, his Columbus Crew side featuring flying wing-backs Max Arfsten and Andrés Herrera, his imminent arrival could be great news for the youngster.

Speaking ahead of the clash with Braga, then-manager Rodgers praised Donovan’s “outstanding” performances, labelling him a “real bright spark” as well as heralding his “personality” and “mentality”.

Well, these all feel like compliments that could be thrown the way of a certain McGregor, whose leadership is as invaluable as his quality to this team.

Thus, it is certainly still early days, but all the signs suggest that Celtic supporters are rightly excited about Donovan, who will go on to have quite the career should he manage to match McGregor’s achievements and make 500+ appearances for the club.

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