LAST season saw the previous custodian of the Celtic goal rack up 13 consecutive league clean sheets, rewriting Scottish football's history books by going 1,256 minutes without conceding.

But forget Fraser Forster. Right now Craig Gordon would settle for two league matches in a row without facing the ignominy of fishing the ball from his net.

For all Gordon's imperious performances, it is a symptom of the Parkhead side's indifferent form under Ronny Deila that back-to-back zero entries in the goals against column hasn't been achieved in any two games since the opening round Champions League qualifiers against KR Reykjavik, when Forster was still the No 1. Winning games is what matters most, but this statistic certainly wasn't lost on Gordon as he trudged off the Parkhead surface following the somewhat fortuitous 2-1 victory against FC Astra Giurgiu on Thursday night.

"I don't set targets for clean sheets," said Gordon. "You can't control that, you can only control your performance and that's all I look for. If you're doing well consistently, the clean sheets will come. But - while I'll take the win - I was pretty annoyed in the dressing room afterwards that I didn't get one against Astra. For the first 10-15 minutes I wasn't amused. If I get as many as Fraser did I'll be doing alright, but nah, that's not something I'll think about. Just getting a couple in a row would be a good start."

In four attempts, Celtic have yet to win a solitary Premiership match the weekend after a Champions League or Europa League tie, a statistic which suggests the club must do better in limiting their exertions on these European nights. Alarm bells truly will be ringing if Kilmarnock can repeat the feat at Parkhead this afternoon, but Gordon feels the return of players such as Mikael Lustig, Charlie Mulgrew and Adam Matthews can only help generate that consistency which has eluded them so far.

"There's so many factors," he said, "but we're getting our bigger players back now and I am sure we will settle into a rhythm. There are first-team players sitting in the stand for the first time this season and once everyone gets playing together and we get settled, I'm sure things will go from strength to strength."

Lustig, in particular, seems worthy of mention, not least because on Thursday night he was one of the side's most effective performers, regardless of the fact his four-week-old daughter Lexie only returned to the family home in the last few days after being rushed to Yorkhill Hospital suffering from a mystery illness.

"He's such a good pro," said Gordon. "When he's out there you know exactly what he's going to give. And I can relate to what he's going through - football takes a total back seat when it comes to family. He's a strong lad and you could hardly tell the difference when he was out there on Thursday night. He just does the same thing week in week out and that's a credit to him as well."

While Celtic sit happily on seven points in their Europa League section, knowing that a second win against the Romanians would be sufficient to book their place in the knockout stages, perhaps typically Lustig was in no mood to airbrush their failings in midweek.

"It was a crap performance, to be fair," said the Swede. "At least we showed character, although our football wasn't the best. I don't know if we can blame the grass or the ball. I don't know, but you saw a lot of players who are usually very, very good with passing losing the ball a bit too often, but they didn't create too much either so I wouldn't say we were lucky to get the three points. But we should be playing better than this."