Celtic Fan View: Stuart Armstrong is finally proving his worth at Celtic Park

Perhaps a measure of Celtic’s extremely strong performances this season is that so many of their players have received recognition in mass. Kieran Tierney, Tom Rogic, James Forrest and Scott Sinclair have been applauded for their impressive showings; Moussa Dembele’s exploits have seen him linked with some of the world’s elite clubs and Scott Brown has been deserving of the praise heaped on him by manager Brendan Rodgers and the media.

In the last week, Brown in particular has been at the centre of attention as he came out of international retirement for Scotland’s 3-0 loss at Wembley. This campaign has been Brown’s best in a Celtic jersey by a considerable distance; under Rodgers’ he’s finally taking games by the scruff of the neck on a consistent basis and proving to be a fine leader in a relatively young side.

However, he’s not the only midfielder who’s been reborn under the Irishman. Stuart Armstrong has found some serious form too having fallen by the wayside last term during Ronny Deila’s helter skelter reign at Parkhead.

He couldn’t have made a better start to his career at Paradise, though, scoring within the first 30 minutes of his debut against Partick Thistle after signing in the 2015 winter transfer window. A week later, he scored and helped force an own goal in his first home match in the 3-3 draw against Inter Milan in Europa League. Already, people believed Celtic had signed the complete midfielder who was going excite the fans for many years to come.

Yet, when he was expected to progress after such an incredible start things only slowed down for Armstrong and then fell to a complete halt during the following season. He wasn’t at ease with his role on the left side of midfield, becoming one of the chief victims in Deila’s stacked and imbalanced midfield culminating in a severe lack of consistency. He became a somewhat peripheral figure, frustrated by Deila’s reluctance to play him in his best role.

Once Deila departed, though, it gave the ex Dundee United prodigy the opportunity to start again and with the help of his new manager who’s playing Armstrong in his favoured central midfield position, he’s grabbed the chance to prove his worth.

Like Brown, there’s been a complete turnaround in form and confidence. He’s re-energised, focused and enjoying his football once again. ‘Energy’ or ‘athleticism’ are keywords often associated with Armstrong, it’s definitely the main aspect of his game and while you could only see that in rare bursts under Deila, Rodgers has helped him fuse those qualities with the temperament, timing and tactical nous to make him a force domestically. From feeling alienated on the left flank, Armstrong is fast becoming a well rounded box-to-box midfielder capable of changing a game.

There are no better examples of that than both games against Rangers in the last two months. In the first meeting between the sides, Armstrong was subbed on for Nir Bitton in the 54th minute with the score at 2-1 and his presence in midfield helped the Bhoys completely overrun their rivals in an eventual 5-1 win while he netted the last of the goals. At Hampden in the League Cup semi-final, he made a significant impact from the bench in a similar manner while the score was 0-0. His penetrating runs from a deep position were too much for the Gers to handle, completely pushing Mark Warburton’s men back as the Hoops secured a late 1-0 victory.

On a technical level, the 24-year-old is sound but it’s his attributes off the ball that make him a manager’s dream- he presses effectively and possesses the intelligence and awareness to be effective in the engine room. Rodgers’ admiration for Armstrong is evident whenever he speaks about the former under-21 international and he made it clear that he wants to continue working with the former Tangerine star to mould him into a dominant player in the centre of the pitch.

“He is a player I really enjoy working with, he is super-bright and thinks about the game and his role in the team,” said Rodgers. The Northern Irishman added: “He is starting to flourish now and it’s down to him, getting the confidence to play the role, understanding his job. Anywhere centrally where he can use his power and pace to break forward, that’s his best position. Hopefully over the coming years you will really see the best of him.”

It’s exactly the guidance Armstrong has needed to move up a gear as he recently pointed out. “It was a developing frustration for me last season, playing on the left. Playing in the middle is a lot more comfortable for me. That’s where I feel I’m best and it’s good to know that, when I do play, I will be playing in there and that gives me confidence.”

He also said: “I had to step back and get in the queue for that central role and work hard in training to try and prove that I could play in a No 10 role or a No 8 role. That was hard work and a challenge for me. But I have been keeping my head down and trying to prove myself.”

That hard work has certainly been paying off of late. Armstrong has started the last four games- displacing Bitton in the middle of the park- playing 90 minutes in each and recording a goal and two assists as well as winning the man of the match award in two of those encounters. In each of those matches we’ve also seen various aspects to Armstrong’s game; while he controlled proceedings in the victory over Ross County, he reverted back to a box-to-box role against Aberdeen and Borussia Monchengladbach then played the majority of the game against Inverness Caley Thistle as a right-back following Mikael Lustig’s injury. Rodgers joked that he was the “Blond Cafu” after the display against Caley but his versatility gives the Hoops a different dimension and it looks likely to keep him ahead of Bitton in the near future.

If Armstrong can hold down his position in the starting XI and show greater signs of progression, he may also earn a recall to the Scotland set up which his club manager backs him to do, “there is absolutely no question he is a player that can feature for his national team.” At 24, there’s still plenty of time for Rodgers to mould Armstrong into a clinical midfielder and he’s right when he says the best is yet to come from Armstrong.