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ALAN Stubbs believes Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers will seek to make ‘a lot of changes’ to his squad in a bid to have more of an impact on next season’s Champions League.
With the 2-0 defeat to Barcelona ensuring European football is over prematurely for another year, the Hoops are fully expected to now win the Premiership at a canter.
However, it is the continental competition that Stubbs reckons will preoccupy Rodgers’ thoughts when he draws up a wish-list of signing targets – and players he deems surplus to requirements – for next term.
And Stubbs, the former Celtic defender, is convinced that means targeting ‘marquee’ recruits.
The ex-Hibs manager said: “This campaign’s over now but I think you’ll see a different Celtic side that lines up for the next Champions League campaign.
“I think there will be a lot of changes come the next one. Brendan knows there are players there that he needs to replace.
“He has to use them for now but come next season I think there’ll be a big change again.
“He’s trimmed the squad, in terms of the numbers, but what I think he’ll do is bring in a couple of marquee signings, in terms of real quality on the Champions League stage, not necessarily the domestic stage.
“This is where that quality really does stick out.”
Meanwhile, despite crashing out of both the Champions League and the Europa League with still a game to go, Stubbs is adamant there are ‘signs of progress’ at his old club under Rodgers.
He added to BBC Scotland: “It’s a shame they’ve gone out. I think we were all probably expecting that they would have gone into the Europa League.
“Unfortunately that hasn’t been the case but I still think there’s positives to take and signs of progress.
“From that point of view it’s not all doom and gloom.”
