You might imagine that when 60-thousand odd people are screaming at you to pass the ball forward, it would be difficult to ignore them and adhere to your manager’s instructions, particularly when you know that recycling the ball instead is likely to provoke groans from all sides of the stadium.

With the greatest of respect to the fans though, when Luke McCowan is playing for Celtic, there is only one voice that matters to him. And that belongs to Brendan Rodgers.

McCowan, growing up a Celtic fan himself in a Celtic family, knows only too well the emotional rollercoaster that his fellow supporters can go on during a match. So, while his manager felt moved to dig out sections of the Celtic support for their lack of patience last week, the midfielder isn’t about to lecture anyone on how to back their team.

Rodgers’ words may have caused a stooshie last week, but McCowan says he is oblivious to what is going on in the stands, and it is only if he ends up being barked at from the dugout that his ears will prick up.

“It doesn't bother me,” McCowan said.

“You listen to the manager. If the manager screams at you, that's when you take notice! If he's screaming at you, then ok, I definitely listen to him.

(Image: Steve Welsh - PA) “But, listen, you go to other places and it's the fans shouting other stuff at you, never mind 'pass it forward'! So that's just what happens. You just need to block it out and play your game.

“Players block it out, don't really notice it or talk about it. If the manager sees it, notices it and speaks about it, fair enough.

“I'm not going to tell him what to do. But we don't really care. You play your football the way you play it, and we know it works. We kind of do it that way and it goes from there.

“My dad used to watch the derbies and he wouldn't actually watch the telly. He'd pace the whole living room! So, I've seen them, I know exactly how they react and whatever else, so it doesn't matter. It's just about how you're playing your football. You block all that out and you just try and perform as well as you can to get results.

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“Of course, we need to have patience regardless. If a team comes to Celtic Park and they sit 11 behind the ball, we need to have more patience than the fans, which is a normal thing.

“But as I said, I'm not going to sit here and tell Celtic fans how to feel. They've been doing it forever and that's just the way it is. You need to have a good spirit in the games and you need to react positively to whatever noises the fans are making.

“If it's happy, if it's not, just keep yourself level-headed and, as I said, react to the good play we do and go from there.”

The other strand to Rodgers’ beef with some of his fans stemmed from what he viewed as their ‘disrespect’ towards Greg Taylor, with the Celtic manager taking umbrage with their singing of a song about Kieran Tierney, who is in talks over a potential return to the club this month.

McCowan has known Taylor since they were in their early teens, so he was confident that the left back would take the furore in his stride, as he proved in a typically accomplished display against Dundee United during the week.

“He's changed now, he's big time now!” he laughed.

(Image: Steve Welsh - PA) “Nah, he's a great guy, he's never changed at all. It's nice to see how he handles all this stuff and just how he handles just being at this club, it's been a credit to him, but it helps me a lot.

“He's been doing it for about five or six years now. He's a great...I keep saying role model, but I don't know what else to say because he's my age, so I cannae call him a role model!

“He's a great teammate just to watch because, obviously, he's my age and he's been here for a few years and it's good to learn that from him.

“I've come in and seen how he handles games, seen how he handles pressure, seen how he handles anything at all, really just within a week, a big game coming up, how he handles it.

“Because I've known him for so many years, it's been nice that, and as I said, he's a credit to himself and his family for how he handles things.”