After a hectic few weeks in the Premiership season, Ange Postecoglou's Celtic side enjoy a rest from their title charge on Sunday, with Raith Rovers visiting Parkhead in the fifth round of the Scottish Cup.

With the greatest of respect to Rovers, a home tie against a team who currently occupy fourth place in the Championship should not pose the Premiership leaders too much trouble. The fixture is a perfect opportunity for Postecoglou to award some much-needed first-team minutes to some of his peripheral squad members - such as Stephen Welsh, Nir Bitton and Scott Bain - along with those returning from injury.

One player who falls into the latter category is Christopher Jullien, the centre-back who last featured for the Bhoys back in December 2020, with a cruciate ligament injury keeping the defender sidelined for over a year.

However, speaking about the 28-year-old, Postecoglou hinted in his pre-match press conference that the Frenchman could make a return to action this weekend, with the 56-year-old stating: "I get the level of anticipation with Chris because it's a long-term injury and a significant player for this club and people are really keen.

"My assessment of those things is that with every player we look to give them an opportunity when we think the time is right, to give themselves the best chance to play. Chris has been training really well in terms of consistently being out there without any issues, which is important, that's the first thing. The second thing is when does he get his opportunity?

"Look, he'll be involved in the squad, definitely, on Sunday. Whether he gets any game time that depends on how I think the starting eleven will look or, if he's not in the starting eleven, what changes I can make during the game. He's just got to keep doing what he's doing. I don't think anyone here hasn't got their opportunity, he'll get his opportunity and then it'll be up to him."

Postecoglou must unleash Jullien

Considering just how important Jullien was to Celtic prior to his injury last season, it would certainly appear a very wise move for Postecoglou to include the centre-back in his starting XI against Raith Rovers on Sunday, in order to get the 28-year-old back up to speed as quickly as possible.

Indeed, over his nine Premiership appearances in the Hoops' 2020/21 campaign, the £4.95m-rated man helped his side to keep five clean sheets, scored one goal and provided one assist. He also averaged 1.2 interceptions, 1.2 tackles and 3.6 clearances and won 6.9 duels - at a success rate of 67% - per game.

These returns saw the £20k-per-week defender average a remarkable SofaScore match rating of 7.43, ranking him as the Bhoys' second-best player in the Scottish top flight last term.

As such, should Jullien be able to rediscover this level of form in the second half of the current campaign, it is certain that the player who Neil Lennon dubbed both "brave" and a "threat" will play a game-changing role in Celtic's bid to reclaim their Premiership crown this season. That leads us to believe that Postecoglou must unleash the centre-back against Raith Rovers tomorrow.

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