The clean sheet looks good, don’t you think?
I think it’s a good sign that you’re coming away from a European game and we’ve drawn and kept a clean sheet and we’re still slightly disappointed. But it was a tough game.
They played a very defensive game, man-to-man, which made it really difficult. A difficult pitch, all these things, but we’re still a little bit disappointed that we didn’t manage to create more.
All eyes now turn to Sunday. It’s just one big game after another, isn’t it? How much are you looking forward to the Final?
Yeah, I think in these types of games, it’s important for us as players to take the emotion out of the game, to play the game, not the occasion.
We need to play it with precision and make sure that we hit the standards that we’ve set and we keep being ambitious, we keep pushing forward.
Do you have experience of winning cup finals with the manager at Leicester? How is your recollection of that day?
It was a good day, a very good day. It was a very tight game as these things tend to be and we had a great day. Unfortunately, it was just as we were reopening after COVID-19, so we didn’t actually get to celebrate it with our fans.
But, yeah, we had a good day and then the problem was we were playing three days after against Chelsea again, so it wasn’t that much that we got to celebrate it. But it was a very positive experience.
You won’t have that problem this time, you’ll be able to celebrate with fans alright?
One thing at a time.
Is this the type of game that is why you join a club like Celtic?
To be honest, I think it’s every occasion. I think when you join a club like Celtic, the size of the club, everywhere you go, you even see [in Zagreb] how many fans that travel. That’s not normal. I’ve played in a lot of clubs and that’s not normal that you have that amount of support everywhere you go.
So those are the reasons, of course. One of the big reasons. But one of the reasons also is to perform and to get results for all those people who travel and spend a lot of money to come in and support their team. They’re just as important occasions.
Does that make it maybe even easier to prepare for a cup final when every game has that status to it and the fans are always there expecting?
I think the standards are set at a club like Celtic. You walk in the training ground, you walk in the stadium, it’s just steeped in history.
You look around, every single photo on the wall is of some kind of legend lifting a trophy, so you know what’s expected.
Kasper, what’s your thought process on going forward? Regarding the contract situation, what’s your thought process beyond this season?
The next game. I think with the experience I have, I think the one thing experience has really taught me is to never take anything for granted.
Take every single day as it comes. Enjoy every single game that you get to play. And then we take it from there. At the moment, it’s not even on my radar. The most important thing is winning on Sunday now.
You’ve played at Hamden for Denmark, also in a semi-final, what’s your recollection of that as a ground and the experience of playing at that ground?
Yeah, it’s a terrific ground. Every time I’ve played there, there’s always been a good pitch, always been a good atmosphere. So yeah, really looking forward to it.
Looking forward to a 50-50 split with the fans?
Yeah, I think it’s a great occasion, particularly for the fans.
Like I said before, I think for us as players, it’s about removing the emotion from the game and playing the game and not getting caught up in the emotion and the occasion.
Our job is to go and win a football match and I think that’s how we should approach it.
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