The Celtic man has had an excellent start to the season.
Neil Lennon goes up against Rice this Saturday lunchtime as club football gets back underway after a long, gruesome international break.
The Hoops will be looking to maintain their perfect Scottish Premiership record this season.
A key man in those efforts will likely be Christie, who has had an exceptional 2019/20 so far.
For Rice that form is pleasing to see. Christie is a player Rice worked with as a coach when the pair were at Inverness Caledonian Thistle.
The Accies man reckons he was always destined for the top, being a big fan of the player prior to Ronny Deila signing him up at Celtic in 2015.
However, Rice has been blown away by the levels the attacking midfielder is currently reaching for the Hoops, citing a recent European encounter as the perfect example.
As quoted by The Scottish Sun, he said: “He has kicked on to a different level. I watched him in the European tie against AIK and I couldn’t believe what I was watching. He was tremendous.
“Ryan has been one of Celtic’s best players this season. He’s got a great knack of scoring goals and some of them have been outstanding. He’s playing with a great deal of confidence and he’s a real danger to the opposition.
“But it’s our job to try to keep him quiet and take him back down the pitch and make sure he’s doing his running that way. I always look to see how he’s doing, but I just hope he doesn’t do well this Saturday.”
Can Christie improve even further?
The Scotland international’s eight goals and five assists this season demonstrate he is already operating at a very high level for the Hoops.
However, there is a sense he isn’t plateauing or ready to slow down any time soon.
At 24 he is still young enough to be learning every time he takes the pitch. He’s already added plenty to his game over the last 12 months.
Now more physically robust, he is capable of playing an all-round game despite primarily being tasked with unlocking the opposition defence.
It’s an energy not present elsewhere in other Celtic attacking midfielders such as Tom Rogic and Olivier Ntcham.
As he becomes ever more clinical in front of goal, there’s every reason to think we haven’t even seen the best of Christie yet.
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