Shaun Maloney: CelticPlayer exclusive interview

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Celtic F.C.

·13 July 2026

Shaun Maloney: CelticPlayer exclusive interview

Celtic arrived in Portugal last Wednesday (July 8) for a warm-weather training camp as the Hoops step up their preparations for the season ahead.

With a friendly match against Shelbourne already under their belt, Martin O’Neill’s men have a tough test against Sporting CP at the Estadio Algarve to look forward to this Tuesday (July 14, KO 5.30pm), a match which will come off the back of an intense training schedule for the Bhoys.

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With pre-season now in full swing for the Champions, CelticPlayer sat down with Assistant Manager Shaun Maloney at the team’s training base in Portugal to get an insight in to the camp so far.

Maloney said: “It’s been good. For the players, I’d imagine it’s been quite difficult. We’ve done a lot of sessions now.

“We've got sort of different groups of players. We've got some of the more senior first-team players, we've got a lot of the B-team boys and a lot of boys that maybe came back to us from loans.

‘Some of the young players, it's the first time seeing them up close for a prolonged period, so it's been good.’

“We’ve done a lot of double sessions, even before we came to Ireland. That’s pretty normal with pre-season.

“But it’s harder for the young lads. They’ve only had one pre-season in their career, which was last year when they were 16. So they’ve got that step-up in intensity and the level of play.”

Shaun Maloney's full interview is available to watch exclusively on CelticPlayer