Barcelona strutting their stuff at Cappielow?

AC Milan trotting out on to the hallowed turf at Livingston? Don't worry, nobody has dropped a hallucinogen into your cup of tea.

Celtic's last-gasp qualification for the group stages of the Champions League last week will produce a few spin-offs but away from the glamour and the financial windfall of the first-team's high-profile escapades, there are plenty of fringe benefits. When James Forrest blasted home an injury time winner against Shakhter Karagandy to confirm Celtic's seat on the gravy train, it was perhaps a fitting finale. As a product of the Parkhead youth system, his golden goal ensured that the current crop of under-19s will get the opportunity to go toe-to-toe with the cream of Europe too. Celtic's youth team will take their place in the newly formed UEFA Youth League and, like the big boys, they will square up to Barcelona, AC Milan and Ajax in a junior version of the group of death. The home games will be played at the grounds of Morton and Livingston and, who knows, perhaps Barca's next superstar may just utter the immortal line: "It's always been my dream to play in Greenock."

For the Celtic youth coach, John Kennedy, the timely intervention of Forrest on a raucous night in the east end was particularly satisfying. "If we can produce more James Forrests, we will be very pleased," said the 30-year-old. "It did make me proud to see him score the goal against Shakhter. I never worked with James in the academy but I know how it feels to get an opportunity to play in the big games. It's exciting for us. It's probably as tough a group for the first team as it is for ourselves. Barcelona and Ajax are two of the best academies in the world, and you then add in a top team like AC Milan.

"But we have a good academy ourselves and the boys want to test themselves against the best. When you see a homegrown talent coming through to score a massive goal in a game like that, it gives you a buzz. It's something we will try to replicate at our level so our players can step in to the first team and carry on from what James has done."

Kennedy knows what it's like to be plunged into the bear pit, of course. As a young, highly promising defender he sparkled in Camp Nou back in 2004 as Celtic held on grimly for a 1-0 aggregate victory over the mighty Barcelona in the last 16 of the UEFA Cup. He also came on as a substitute when Parkhead rocked to a 2-1 defeat of the reigning European Champions, AC Milan in 2007. "These are experiences I will never forget and hopefully these are things we can pass on to the younger players and they get the chance to do it in later years," said Kennedy, whose playing career was cruelly cut short by a devastating knee injury. "Playing in front of a capacity crowd in the Champions League at Parkhead? It doesn't get much better than that."

Two years ago, Tony Watt scored for Celtic's youth team against Barcelona in the NextGen Series, the forerunner to the UEFA Youth League, and went on to score the winner against the Catalan giants in the Champions League proper last season as Neil Lennon's battlers progressed to the last 16. It was fairytale stuff and, while Celtic's first team are facing a monumental task to get out of the group this time round, Kennedy knows that miracles can occasionally happen.

"Celtic beat Barcelona and the man who scores the winning goal will be remembered for a long time," he said. "You go down in history and there will be a few in the current team hoping to go and do that this season. Last season this team took Barcelona all the way in the Nou Camp and then beat them here.

"When Neil sends them on to the pitch and they carry off the gameplan then anything can happen. When you come to Celtic Park in the Champions League, the home team could be the biggest underdog in the world but as a club we tend to produce the goods.

"If we come through this it will pretty much be a miracle by Neil and he will deserve all the praise in the world."