Brendan Rodgers paints stark Celtic transfer reality as he names what's needed to keep Champions League class

Brendan Rodgers has said it’s clear the work Celtic must do in the rest of the transfer window after they set up a Champions League knockout round play-off tie with some of Europe’s best.

The Hoops travelled to Aston Villa knowing they had a place in the next round of the competition banked. They put up a valiant effort against Premier League opposition amid absences for key stars, coming from two goals down to make it 2-2 before eventually losing 4-2.

Now they face a glamour tie against either Bayern Munich or Real Madrid next month with a European clash for the ages not long away. Rodgers has reacted to the defeat in Birmingham, where he was without key defender Cameron Carter-Vickers and winger Daizen Maeda.

Youngsters Dane Murray and Daniel Cummings came into the game in a week where although Jota has returned to Parkhead, they have also lost Kyogo to Rennes. Kieran Tierney’s return is a deal being pursued for this month rather than the summer. Rodgers says work needs done to improve the squad, as adding quality is one of the few ways to sustain progress in the Champions League.

He said: "It was a brilliant game to be involved in. The word that strikes me at the moment is pride. We're coming to a team that over the last couple of years have been at the highest level in the Premier League. We played with so much courage.

"They get the first goal and a quick second and then there's a question asked of you as a team, everything about you. But the players continued to play, we started to get into contention, got our aggression back and that gave us the opportunity. We scored two very good goals, and overall to take the game to injury time was a great effort. We're obviously disappointed to lose but we played our part in a really good game.

"That was always the objective, to come in and be competitive at this level. You see the work we need to do to improve the squad, to really be able to sustain that challenge. We were having to bring on young players who haven't played for Celtic before.

"[Adam Idah] done really well. Those are two big goals for him, and how we created the goals was very good. He is where he should be in the box, he was a handful all night and that will be big for his confidence. The experience we've gained will have given the players confidence. We know we can make it really difficult for teams.

"I've really enjoyed [the new format]. I'm pretty sure there would have been a level of excitement tonight with who you might get. I've enjoyed the variance of the games. Scotland gets a wee bit of stick in its football. You can clearly see we have teams who have courage to play. We're nowhere near the resource levels of teams in the Premier League, but we can still be competitive."