CELTIC YOUNGSTER EOGHAN O’Connell has described his delight at scoring at spectacular goal against reigning Premier League champions Leicester on Saturday.
O’Connell’s sweetly-struck effort levelled the International Champions Cup game at 1-1, before Brendan Rodgers’ side were ultimately beaten 6-5 on penalties.
The Ireland U21 defender — who is the cousin of Irish rugby legend Paul O’Connell and who had a brief spell on loan at Cork City earlier this year — modestly described the strike as “lucky” in an interview with the official Celtic website.
It came out and I called Stu (Stuart Armstrong) to leave it,” he said. “I just felt I could run round and bend my foot around it. Luckily enough, it went in so I’m delighted.
“Emilio (Izaguirre) was out wide so I was going to roll it to him but I just thought, ‘Why not hit it,’ so I had to run round it as I didn’t want to swing the old ‘left Duke’ at it. I went with the right and it went in.
“It’s my first goal for the first-team so it was a good finish and I was delighted.
We’re at the stage now where all games matter and we’ve got the game against FC Astana (in the Champions League third qualifying round) coming on Wednesday. Leicester have just started in pre-season so every game is going to matter to them too. It was a very high-tempo and I was delighted to get a goal in a big game like that.”
The 20-year-old can play both centre-back and full-back and has already made a couple of competitive appearances for the Scottish champions.
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