Great to be going home- Rodgers reacts to Celtic July deal

Celtic have announced that they will play Cork City at Páirc Uí Chaoimh on July 8, their first confirmed pre-season fixture.

The SPFL season starts on the weekend of August 1-3 with Celtic expected to start that campaign looking to be champions of Scotland for the 56th time.

Last summer Celtic prepared for the new season with a very successful three match tour of the USA on top of a fortnight long training regime that established a style of play that carried into the new season.

The previous season Celtic trained in Portugal, played two matches in Japan then took on Wolves at the Aviva Arena in Dublin with that match initially scheduled for South Korea.

With no international tournaments this summer Rodgers will have a full squad to work with in pre-season, discussing the Cork City fixture the first team manager told the club website:

We are delighted to be travelling to Cork to play in this fantastic match in the summertime. We will be visiting a great stadium in a fine city and we are sure the game will be a wonderful occasion.

Celtic’s Irish connections are very important to the Club and we are sure there will be huge interest in the match. From my own perspective it will be great to be going home to Ireland but also from a footballing side we are really looking forward to the match against Cork City, which will be an important part of our preparations for next season.

It is bound to be a big date for Adam Idah, brought up in Cork he joined Celtic on a permanent deal from Norwich in August after a highly successful loan spell capped by the winning goal in the 2024 Scottish Cup Final.

On Sunday the hoops face Hibs in the quarter-final of the Scottish Cup as they aim to retain last season’s trophies after reclaiming the League Cup in December.