Paulo Bernardo eager to get back in action for Celtic season finale after injury

Celtic midfielder Paulo Bernardo is eager to get back in action for the season finale after recovering from an ankle injury.

The Portugal Under-21 international is in contention to feature in Saturday’s William Hill Premiership encounter against Hearts at Celtic Park.

The 23-year-old suffered his injury during a Scottish Gas Scottish Cup win over Raith Rovers on February 8.

“I can play football again so I’m really excited for the coming weeks,” Bernardo said. “The injury was bad but I recovered very well and hopefully I can play from now on.

“It’s been a while for me being off the pitch so probably not 90 minutes but I will do the best as I can if the coach wants me to play.

“I had the opportunity to recover well and to work on other things that I couldn’t do during the season. It was a good time to recover and to do other things too.”

Bernardo missed the Champions League encounters with Bayern Munich as well as the recent defeat by Rangers but he has a semi-final against St Johnstone to look forward to next month while Celtic are 13 points clear in the league with eight matches left.

“We as a team still have some goals to achieve and we will try our best to do that as soon as possible,” Bernardo said.

“For me personally, I want to have good games before the end of the season and do my best every game. Each opportunity that I have, I will try to give it all on the pitch.”