Wounded Callum McGregor is in it for the long run

He trudged off burdened with the incipient depression that marks the mind of the substituted substitute.

The 21-year-old had come with a sprightly sprint as an eighth-minute substitute for Celtic against Ross County. He would not survive another hour of playing time, hauled off by Ronny Deila in the diabolical 66th minute as Celtic struggled to break down the bottom side in the league.

It was a moment that serves as a reminder that professional sport is ruthless, cares little for personal feelings and can be the scene of a very public scrutiny.

McGregor is in his first full season as a Celtic player. He has already savoured fleeting glory. He knows now that a career does not ascend unbroken and straight towards success and fulfilment.

"Nobody had to say anything to me," he said, reflecting on a Saturday afternoon that ended disappointingly for player and team. The hook on McGregor did not produce a breakthrough against Ross County.

"I have tried to take it in my stride. It was obviously a bit disappointing but I have to learn from it. I have to try not to be too disappointed about it and try to keep going. I have not spoken to the manager but hopefully I will speak to him in the next day or so and hopefully clear it up," said McGregor. He was calm, he was articulate, he was polite. He was also hurting.

He spoke clearly about how a manager must do what he thinks is best for the team and that he was prepared to play any time in any position. But there was still pain.

"I was a bit surprised when the board went up as I was playing well in the game and had just hit the bar, was growing into the game. I was a bit surprised. But it is his decision, he is the manager and obviously thought it was best for the team at the time. That's fine by me."

There was a repetition in the comments that suggest that if McGregor said them often enough he could accept them as being the only response to a difficult moment in a career that has soared in six months.

He will not be allowed to sit in a corner and nurse any perceived slight. "A few of the boys have noised me up about it, though. But it is just banter. It has been funny," he said of his return to training.

On reflection, he may view his abrupt departure on Saturday as merely a bump in the road of an extraordinary journey that started on July 3 in Bad Wimsbach, Austria. Young McGregor had returned from a loan spell at Notts County and scored the third goal in a 3-1 victory over FC Krasnodar. Two weeks later, on his competitive debut for the club, he scored the only goal in the away tie in Champions League qualifying against FC Reykjavik.

A five-year contract with the club soon followed and McGregor was called up to a Scotland squad. These were the undoubted highlights of an extraordinary year.

But McGregor is honest. He accepts that surge in form has not been maintained. He has become relatively becalmed and this may have persuaded his manager to substitute him at Celtic Park.

"I have had a wee dip," he said. "I was playing really well. I was probably playing the best football of my career so far and it is hard to sustain that. It has been a good learning curve to try to stay on that level. That is the key to sustaining a career here."

He knows there is a gap between himself and experienced team-mates. "Obviously players like Browny [Scott Brown] have been here six, seven years and you can see that every time he goes on the field he is giving you a seven, eight out of ten every week. That is the reason he is the captain, the driving force behind the team. You learn from guys like that and hopefully put it into your game as well," he said.

Indeed, Brown has proved to be a mentor as well as an inspiration. "His example is excellent. Every day he is one of the first on the training ground always the last to leave. He is always in the gym doing his stuff and he has bags of experience to give to the younger players. He is one I try to look to."

It would not be hard to imagine Brown leading the dressing-room reaction to the substituted substitute. But it becomes clear he is the player that McGregor would consult in difficult times.

"I talk to him a lot. He has a wealth of knowledge about football, even off-the-field stuff as well. He tries to keep me right as much as he can and he is definitely a good player to learn from.

"He enjoys the dressing room, he loves the club, he has a daft side but when it comes to serious football he clicks on, he has a switch and he is totally professional."

McGregor, too, has this characteristic of being committed to improving. "I set myself short-term and long-term goals to make sure that I am always bang at it and to try to improve all the time. I now just want to get back in the team, start every week, just to lift my performances again to the level they were at and see where that takes me. If I could back into the Scotland set-up that would be brilliant as well."

McGregor, who was on and an off in a hour's play on Saturday, is in it for the long run.