Rangers host Celtic in the latest Old Firm derby at Ibrox today.
Rangers defender Nikola Katic has told The Scottish Sun that he is friends with Celtic pair Filip Benkovic and Jozo Simunovic – but will tell teammates how to exploit the latter.
The Gers play host to Celtic this afternoon, with the latest Old Firm derby coming just over a month after their last meeting at Parkhead.
All three games this season have been tight affairs, with Celtic winning both Parkhead battles, 1-0 and 2-1 respectively, whilst Rangers beat Celtic 1-0 at Ibrox back in December.
Steven Gerrard will hope for a repeat of that performance this afternoon, with the two bitter rivals set to do battle yet again in one of the world’s most volatile derbies.
However, there’s also been friendship emerging between the two clubs, predominantly from the Croatian-born flavour in the two sides.
Rangers have Croatian defenders Nikola Katic and Borna Barisic, whilst Celtic have Filip Benkovic and Jozo Simunovic, though the latter has since switched his international allegiance to Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Now, Katic has revealed that the four are friends, but don’t talk about football off the pitch, instead just doing anything to divert conversations away from football.
Katic added that he was at church with Benkovic last week, and whilst he loves Simunovic as a friend, he’ll ‘definitely’ speak to his teammates about his weaknesses and how to exploit him in the Celtic defence.
“Jozo and Ajer are good in the air so we will speak with our coach and decide what we will do at set-pieces, decide what is the best way to defend them,” said Katic. “Of course I can advise our strikers about his weaknesses and we’ll definitely speak about that. When I arrived here, I knew him and Filip from the national team and we were friends. We are still friends but out on the pitch I am only looking out for Rangers.”
“I don’t care who is Jozo and who is Filip — and they don’t care who is Niko. So I will give everything to stop him on the pitch and help us to win the game. When we’re out, football is OFF the table. We talk about women, about countries, about holidays. We ask each other how the game is — ‘I played good’ for two minutes — and then we move on. I have not tried to get any secrets. There is too much football throughout the year, you can get tired of it sometimes and so we find other things to talk about.”
“It was important to have friends in Scotland because this is a big club and at first I was alone. The first two months I just spoke with Jozo. I didn’t know if it was the right thing or not, but as soon as Borna Barisic arrived at Rangers we started to go out. We are friends off the pitch but on it we give everything for our clubs. We always support each other mentally. Jozo has more experience then me, so does Borna, so I am the young lad. They helped me when I was out of the team. I was in church with Filip on Sunday,” he added.
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