PATRICK Roberts has revealed that he modelled himself on the legendary winger Celtic will face when they take on Bayern Munich in Germany tomorrow night when he was growing up – Netherlands great Arjen Robben.
Roberts has once again been one of Brendan Rodgers’s outstanding performers this season and was excellent in the 1-0 win over their Ladbrokes Premiership rivals Dundee at Parkhead on Saturday.
His displays should ensure he is in the starting line-up for the Group B game in the Allianz Arena just as he was for the Champions League meetings with Paris Saint-Germain at home and Anderlecht away last month.
The Manchester City loanee is looking forward to pitting himself against Robben, the former PSV Eindhoven, Chelsea and Real Madrid player, and admitted his ambition in the game is to one day scale the same heights as the Dutchman.
The 33-year-old, who retired from international football this month after winning 96 caps when his country failed to secure a Russia 2018 play-off spot, has lifted league titles in the Netherlands, England, Spain and Germany as well as the Champions League trophy during a stellar career.
“I have always enjoyed the way he comes inside and shoots,” said Roberts. “I’ve tried to emulate that, come in and shoot like that, since he was at Chelsea and I was only a young boy. The way he has come on since then is incredible.
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“Players like that put the hard work in in training throughout the years and that is why they are on the biggest stage in world football. Hopefully one day that can be me, but I need to keep practising my technique.”
Robben is just one of the household names who Bayern manager Jupp Heynckes has at his disposal – Mats Hummels, Robert Lewandowski and Thomas Muller are also set to start against Celtic.
However, Roberts, who scored in the 3-0 win over Anderlecht away last month, is looking forward to the European tie and has insisted the Scottish champions will go into it with high hopes of pulling off an upset.
The way Rodgers’s charges recovered from their 5-0 defeat to PSG in their opening game to triumph over in Belgium has given Roberts hope they can draw with or even win against Bayern.
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“We will see how the game pans out,” he said. “The first thing is to go out there with a strong mindset and hopefully the game pans out and we can get a good result for us.
“They are one of the best teams in world football, they have loads of quality players - Lewandowski, Muller, Robben – so we will have to be really on our game.
"But these are the occasions we strive for and enjoy. So we will look forward to that. We will be positive, show no fear and hopefully things work out for us.
“I think the Anderlecht result just showed our quality and our intent this year, particularly after the first game. We had the mentality not to let it happen again. We have a great bunch of quality players and we knew we could go and get a result there. I think we did that.
“We played our normal game which I didn’t really expect, but we did. To go there and score three goals away from home was top drawer and we will take that into our next games.”
Roberts, who has spent the last season and a half on loan at Celtic from City, was accused of lacking ambition when he returned to Parkhead for another campaign during the summer.
The former Fulham player has since been overlooked by England Under-21 manager Aidy Boothroyd for their European Championship qualifiers against Scotland and Andorra.
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However, the 20-year-old believes the chance to play five-time Champions League winners Bayern in Germany justifies his decision to return to Glasgow to further his career.
“This is why they brought me back, and why I wanted to come back,” he said. “For these nights, I want to push on in European competition, which is an aim. Hopefully, we can do that.
“I’ve never played to the Allianz before. It will be a brilliant and different experience in Munich. I’ll look forward to it when it comes around.”
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