JOHN KENNEDY has issued a rallying cry to his players before Sunday’s Derby at Celtic Part. There’s no material benefit to beating our rivals on the day but the boost it could give the club and the team a much needed spark ahead of the Scottish Cup.

Celtic have not won a Glasgow Derby in 16 months and even that game they battered us only for Fraser Forster to have the game of his life.

The club are going into transition at the end of this season but we’re about to find out this Sunday if any of these players, even the ones who know they’re on their way, has professional pride and cares about what’s happened this term.

We’ll see a more tactically sound Celtic on Sunday but will we see the drive and passion for a full 90 minutes. Celtic have played in fits and bursts during games and have usually faded away in the final 30 minutes. If that happens on Sunday, we rack up another unwanted Derby defeat.

Speaking to CelticTV ahead of the tie, John Kennedy wants his team to go and show what they are capable of:

“It’s a very important to everyone, the fans, the club, the players themselves. Everyone knows what it means.

“It’s not a nothing game, it’s a game in its own right, it’s a derby match and one in which we want to put things right.

“We know we have underachieved in recent (derby) games, especially the last game (a 1-0 defeat at Ibrox), where we thought it was a good performance and then we went down to 10 men and lost the game.

“But that gives us confidence that we can impose our style and win the game which is the most important thing because, again, we might have lost the league title, but we are certainly not away, we are still striving to get back to being the best team in the country.”

It could be a once in a lifetime chance for John to lead out HIS Celtic side against our Glasgow rivals at Celtic Park – let’s hope the players can get him a win.