After watching Cardiff and helping Celtic reach a cup final last week Joe Ledley is hoping that his cup luck is taking a turn for the better.
In 2009 he was in the Cardiff side that lost the FA Cup Final to Portsmouth at Wembley then suffered as Celtic lost last season’s League Cup Final to Rangers.
The Welshman missed Celtic’s Scottish Cup triumph over Motherwell through injury but after helping the side reach next month’s League Cup Final he is hopeful that 2011/12 will turn out to be a very special season.
“It was great for Cardiff to reach a final and for Celtic as well,” he admitted at Hampden. “It was a good solid performance from us against Falkirk and on another day we might have scored a few more goals.
“Last season ended disappointingly but I think that we’ve learned from our mistakes, things are looking well at the moment and we need that to continue.
“We’re still a young bunch of lads but there is a lot of us with international experience and that’s helping the team. I think that it’s a learning curve from our first season.
“I thought that we were fantastic in the Europa League and got some great results in probably the strongest group in the competition.
“We got a lot of benefit from playing against great players and gained experience.
“Every game is going to be difficult from now till the end of the season, we just need to buckle down and hopefully get the results that we all want.”
Ledley joined Celtic from Cardiff in July 2011 but still retains strong ties with his hometown club.
Forthy thousand fans will make the trip from Wales to Wembley with the Celtic midfielder hoping to be amongst them cheering on Malky Mackay’s side.
“There’s an international in midweek so it depends on whether we meet up on the Sunday or Monday,” Ledley explained. “If it’s Monday I’ll go to Wembley.
“I was there with Dave Jones, he did fantastic but Malky has brought in his own staff and players, they are doing really well and it’s nice to see.
“Players like Craig Bellamy, Jay Bothroyd and Michael Choppra all left and that’s a fair bit of quality. A lot was expected without much money but Malky has brought in fantastic players, the team is doing well and I think it’s all down to him- he’s made a big difference.”
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Joe Ledley
A gentleman and a scholar