With 38 goals to his name this season, Leigh Griffiths has played a key role in Celtic’s drive towards a fifth consecutive league title, and his goalscoring exploits have obviously made an impression on his opponents, who have voted for him as PFA Player of the Year. He is up against Jonny Hayes (Aberdeen), Kane Hemmings and Greg Stewart (both Dundee) – indeed, Griffiths cast his vote for Hemmings – and he will certainly be a strong candidate to pick up the award this Sunday night. If he does so, it will go with the trio of awards he won at Celtic’s Player of the Year event last weekend.
Speaking after the PFA Scotland announcement, Griffiths said: "It’s great, especially when your fellow pros are acknowledging what a good job you’ve done. Personally, it’s been the best season of my career. I can’t really complain, with 38 goals, and hopefully there’s still a lot more to come. I got myself back in the Scotland squad, which was good, and hopefully I can add another league title to my collection. It’s always nice to win individual awards, but collectively, as a team, it’s been disappointing. The European campaign wasn’t great, and neither was going out of the cup competitions, but we need to stick together as a squad and we can make history by getting five-in-a-row."
Before getting all dressed up for the Awards ceremony on Sunday, Griffiths is focused on a trip to Tynecastle for the Saturday lunchtime kick-off against Hearts. Celtic know that a win will put them in an almost unassailable position at the top of the Premiership, though they still will have to await the outcome of Aberdeen’s game later in the day against Motherwell. It could well be that the following weekend’s home clash with the Dons turns out be the decisive fixture
Griffiths said: "We’ve got a difficult venue on Saturday but we’re looking to go and get all three points. It’s come to the business end of the season and we just want to get over the line, whether it’s this Saturday or the following week. We just want to get it done as soon as possible. The semi-final was a disappointment and then the gaffer announcing his departure was hard to take, and then it was a frustrating game on Sunday, but we need to bounce back and quickly. Expectation levels at Celtic are exceptional. The demand is for you to win every game and if you don’t there are questions asked, and rightly so, but we’re still going for five-in-a-row. It would mean a lot to me get to 40 goals. Someone tweeted me the other day, letting me know that Henrik scored 38 goals in 48 games and I’ve still got four games to beat that, so if I can I’ll be delighted."