Lewis Stevenson believes that Celtic may already be sitting on the solution to one of Neil Lennon’s biggest problems.
The Hibs defender watched the hoops struggle to find goals in the second half of the season with Odsonne Edouard basically the only striker that the former Hibs boss could call on.
For two months Leigh Griffiths was working out at Lennoxtown but the striker was never pictured on the grass with his team-mates with his attendance confined to the gym.
A comeback was hinted at a couple of times but the nearest that the striker got to pulling his boots on was when he appeared on the park to take part in the SPFL and Scottish Cup winning celebrations.
Stevenson saw the impact that Griffiths had during two loan spells at Easter Road and is in no doubt about the quality Celtic have waiting in the wings.
He told the Daily Record:
It’s great to see Leigh is getting himself back to full fitness. It was shocking and sad to see what he was going through.
Leigh could be your best pal and you wouldn’t know what he is going through and it was something that was very hard to pick up on.
Leigh was in the most capable hands at Celtic and I was glad to see he got the best available support. I got on really well with him so I’m delighted to see he seems to be through the worst of it all.
He is the most natural finisher I have worked with. Whenever Leigh picked up the ball with his left foot you always fancied him to hit the target or score.
I don’t want to see Leigh come back into the Celtic team to tell you the truth as he will score goals for fun. That’s not only bad news for Hibs but for every other team in Scotland.
He can create things out of nothing. He doesn’t just score tap-ins, he can score 30-yard thunderbolts.
If he can recapture anywhere near his best form for Celtic then Neil Lennon won’t need to bring in a new striker. He will save Celtic a whole load of money in the transfer market as he is such a big player.
Griffiths scored his 100th Celtic goal in the Europa League qualifier against Suduva but hasn’t played since December due to personal issues.
