Martin O’Neill ‘very hopeful’ Celtic will start January transfer activity soon

Martin O’Neill remains “very, very hopeful” that Celtic will start their January transfer activity soon after fans pleaded for their club to “sign a player” during a 2-0 Scottish Gas Scottish Cup win over Auchinleck Talbot.

A much-changed but still experienced Celtic side triumphed at Rugby Park thanks to Johnny Kenny’s close-range finish in the 34th minute and a brilliant strike from Sebastian Tounekti, five minutes from time.

O’Neill revealed he freshened up the team with games against Bologna and Hearts in mind and he replied that he was “very, very hopeful” of getting players in ahead of Sunday’s trip to Tynecastle.

The 73-year-old watched Tawanda Maswanhise fire Motherwell into the fifth round with victory over Ross County on Saturday but he was coy over his reasons for travelling to Fir Park. The Zimbabwe attacker now has 15 goals for his club this season.

“That was a football mission,” O’Neill said. “That’s part of my job, to look at the games, if I can get an opportunity. We did it after training, so I went there with (Mark) Fotheringham. It was nice. I enjoyed the game.”

When asked if he was actively looking at the Scottish market, O’Neill said: “I think absolutely there are players here. There’s no doubt at all about it. There are players here that are capable of playing, I think, at a higher level.”

After setting up a fifth-round tie at home to Dundee, the Celtic boss said: “Well, we weren’t fantastic. We weren’t able to break the team down often enough. When we did, we created some chances and we missed them.

“Obviously, we’re delighted with the win and it’s the start of a big week for us.

“I wanted to change the side around because there were a couple of players that had not played under me at this time that I’d like to have seen, and I did do.

“I think making changes like that does disrupt the flow of things. So we saw that one through and it was good and obviously, the preparation at the start of the week ahead.

“Players, when they feel this is an opportunity for them to play, can get a little bit nervous about things. So I probably wasn’t surprised from what I’d seen and we as a team could do a lot better. But we saw it through.”

Talbot boss Tommy Sloan was proud of the way his players competed – especially since they had not played a competitive game since a 5-3 defeat by Drumchapel United on December 20.

“Our goalkeeper didn’t have too many saves,” Sloan said. “He certainly had a few, but he didn’t have too many saves.

“Look, being honest, we’d like to have been a wee bit more adventurous, try to threaten their goal a bit more, but I’m not going to greet about much.

“In a perfect world, I’d have liked that, but the effort was fantastic.

“There’s excuses there. We hadn’t had a game for four weeks or something. We actually played a bounce game, closed doors, and got a sore one. That’s true. We lost seven goals or something. It was a great response from them.”