Daniel Cummings reminded patience is a virtue as Celtic captain hits 500 games
That Callum McGregor clocked up his 500th appearance for Celtic in the win over Motherwell on Sunday is a notable enough achievement on its own merits, but it is even more impressive when you consider he didn’t make his first team debut until he was 21.
The Celtic captain is now an indispensable part of the furniture at the club, but it wasn’t always so. As a youngster, he had to bide his time for his big break, famously playing alongside a young Jack Grealish during a loan spell to Notts County.
He returned to Glasgow in the summer of 2014 determined to force his way into the reckoning under new manager Ronny Deila, scored on his debut against KR Reykjavik, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Naturally, it is a moment for reflection for McGregor, but he is also aware of how his own story acts as something of an allegory for the situation currently unfolding around the latest up and coming talent at the club, young striker Daniel Cummings.
(Image: Robert Perry - PA) Cummings is just 18, but it seems that his own patience for an opportunity at Celtic is already wearing thin.
His contract expires in the summer, and West Ham made an improved offer this morning for Cummings after their earlier £500,000 bid was rejected. That too has been knocked back by Celtic, with the Hammers now hoping to tie Cummings up on a pre-contract agreement.
McGregor can see the parallels between his own situation back in 2013 as he was farmed out on loan and Cummings' current predicament, but from his vantage point in the here and now and with a long, hugely successful Celtic career behind him, he also knows full well the value of sticking it out.
“Yeah, one hundred percent,” McGregor said.
“You know, I think when you're young, patience is something you don't have and especially now in the modern-day world, everything's on your phone, that's so readily available, so the patience is something that probably the young lads don't have so much of now.
“But this is an amazing football club and it can take time. We see it with guys that come in and young players, they come in, they go up, they go down again, they've got to find a level of consistency.
“And then they go back up, and then they stay in, so it does take a bit of time and if you stick it out, it's an amazing learning experience for you as well. Once you get through that spell, then this is an amazing football club with so much pressure and expectation that you can't help but love it.
“And listen, I understand how big this football club is. I think you speak to a lot of players and when they leave they regret it, and they realise, you know, how big the club is.
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“The thing for me is, I grew up five, six minutes away from the stadium, so I felt it my whole childhood. I knew how big the club was, and when I walked through the door at eight, my only thought was to try and make it to play in the first team.
“My family just dedicated their whole life to make sure that I had the best chance possible to play for Celtic, which is insane.
“So, when I think back now, there was so much going into it, it was just that was the be-all-and-end-all, just playing for the first team and having a career at Celtic, and I'm so, so lucky that I've managed to do that.
“Obviously, it is a massive honour [to have played 500 games], it's such a huge football club.”
Did McGregor think though that being loaned out at the age of 20 might be the end of the road for him at Celtic Park?
“I think in my mind, I was going there to try and sort of force my way in as such,” he said.
“And I know that maybe back in the day it wasn't the done thing to go on loan and then come back and kind of use the system that way. It was more, when you don’t make it here, you go and try and find something else.
(Image: SNS Group)
“But it didn't really dawn on me, I just thought, I want to go here, I want to show people that I can play men's football, and I always had that in the back of my head, when I come back, I'm obviously there for a year, I want to come back and I want to play for Celtic.
“So, I guess that was just my mindset of the whole thing, I didn't really take in too much else, I just wanted to go and play and prove to people that I could play at that level.”
The theory that you never really know just how big a club Celtic is until you have left is one that was pertinent at Fir Park on Sunday too, as an emotional Jota marked his return to the club by bagging his side’s third goal in stoppage time.
Brendan Rodgers touched upon the theme after the match, saying he expects even more from the winger this time around as he now knows just how good he has it at Celtic, and McGregor agrees with his manager’s assessment.
“He has settled back in right away as he's got a good connection with the club,” he said.
“He walks straight back in the door, and they welcome him straight back in and I think he felt at ease straight away as well, but that's the one thing he said was 'Cal, I didn't realise how big this club was’.
“He was just buzzing to be back, because of the demands. He felt alive again straight away, and then you see that when he comes on [on Sunday], he's playing on the edge straight away, and he gets his goal, so the one thing about playing here is it keeps you super sharp.”
