Martin O’Neill has stood by Callum McGregor’s comments after Celtic’s draw with Dundee United after being asked if they were a concern.

The Celtic captain spoke of players “not doing things properly” and making the match a ‘basketball game’ in the game on Wednesday evening, leading to concern among the support at the frankness of his words.

They have drawn comparisons to Cameron Carter-Vickers’ comments after defeat to Rangers, which described the performance as ‘random’ and urged the team to “pick a script and stick to it”. He hasn’t started a game since.

Despite fans worrying that the same situation was unfolding with McGregor, his comments have now been approved by O’Neill.

Martin O’Neill on Callum McGregor comments: ‘I totally agree’

The Celtic boss initially didn’t know what his captain had said. When informed of it, he said: “I’ve said this to you before, so I totally agree.

“I totally agree that Callum Osmand is actually really a centre forward. I’ve said this at the press conference: he is, essentially, a centre forward. He probably would play off somebody strong alongside him; I’m not so sure that he could lead the line on his own.

“And that Camilo Duran is really a centre forward, so the players are getting to know each other, it’s as really simple as that there, so I’m in total agreement with Callum. We’ll sort it out; we seem to be doing okay domestically, trying to sort it out.

“Players are playing; there are a few players that haven’t had a chance. Jordan Lotomba hasn’t had a chance yet to play. There’ll be moments, absolutely. There’ll be people in the squad; young Joel van den Berg — again, he just trained today.

“So over the course of the next number of weeks between now and Christmas, I think everybody will be on the field of play, and then it’s a matter of establishing the right positions as much as possible.

“Players have played out of position before, I don’t know whether it was a big issue when young Osmand came on in the Benfica game and set us alight.”