Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers has heaped praise on his Dundee counterpart Neil McCann, ahead of the teams’ Scottish League Cup quarter-final meeting tonight.

The 43-year-old, who started his career at Dundee, was appointed as an interim boss by the Dee in April.




McCann helped Dundee to secure their place in the Scottish Premiership before leaving the club in May.

However, the Dens Park outfit named the ex-Scotland international their new manager the following month.
 


Dundee, who beat St. Johnstone 3-2 last weekend, are currently ninth in the league table with just four points from six games, 12 adrift of leaders Celtic.

relatedNewsStory

But Rodgers insisted that the Hoops are gearing up for a tough game at Dundee, with the former Liverpool boss explaining that he admires McCann’s coaching methods.

“We will anticipate a tough game”, Rodgers said in this week’s Celtic View.

“Neil has gone in there as a new manager and he has wanted to impose his way of working, trying to get the players to open up and have the courage to play.

“I admire that.

“He is trying to take the responsibility on himself to give the players the confidence to do that.

“If he can do that and he gets that time to implement that and he has that courage then it can work very well for him.

“They got a good result against St Johnstone and they will be happy for that and it will give them a boost going into this game.

“But, as always, we concentrate on ourselves and look to work from there.”

Following the clash with Dundee on Wednesday night, Celtic will take on Rangers in the season’s first Glasgow derby at the weekend at Ibrox.