player of the month georgios looking for spl win

Paul Cuddihy
GEORGIOS Samaras and his distinctive green boots have been on a goalscoring spree in September, and his six goals deservedly earned him the Clydesdale Bank Player of the Month Award.

It’s a fitting reward for a player whose contribution to the team has been impressive, both in goals scored and also in his overall play.

Not surprisingly, the modest striker was quick to deflect the praise from himself.

“It’s my first award and I hope more of them will come,” he said. “First of all, I must thank the manager and my team-mates because without them I wouldn’t have won this award.

“The only thing I can do is continue is work hard and help the team perform well and score goals.

“I’m at a club where they really trust me, they respect me and that’s really important for me. They really believe in me, and I don’t need anything else. That’s most important thing for a football player.

“I’m feeling good and I’m sure there’s more to come. I’m never happy with myself. I always want to improve and progress in my career, and I want to do more things for myself and for my team.”

Celtic return to domestic action tomorrow when they play host to SPL new boys, Hamilton.

The game offers a different challenge from the midweek clash with Villarreal, but as Georgios Samaras explained, the Celtic players will not waste any time in dwelling on the disappointment in Spain.

“We’re well prepared for the game tomorrow,” he said. “We must forget what happened last Tuesday and focus on the game tomorrow, to perform really well and try to score goals – that’s our destiny, to win and score goals.

“Everybody knows that the Champions League is a top league with all the top teams, and it was a big difference.

“It’s a great atmosphere, always, playing against top players, but we have to forget that at the moment and focus on the SPL and the game tomorrow. We can’t think about what happened against Villarreal and why we didn’t take a point.

“You are a professional footballer so you must always look to the next game. When you win you can’t be celebrating for days at a time, or when you’ve lost you’re disappointed but the next day you must focus on the next game that’s coming.”

And Gordon Strachan, who is September’s Manager of the Month, praised his striker’s attitude.

“He’s a good team player,” the Celtic manager said. “He doesn’t think he’s special, he thinks he’s part of a team, he wants to be part of a team, he wants to be liked by his team-mates and the coaching staff and the fans and to do that he’s got to be a team player.

“So he doesn’t think he’s special. We’ve got a lot of good players who can turn games but we hope all the good players realise they’re part of a team and he does.”