IN the form of Red Bull Salzburg, or FC Salzburg as Uefa prefer to call them, Celtic will be confronted by a mirror image of themselves on Thursday night.

Aside from the multi-million pound sponsorship from every insomniac's favourite fizzy drink firm, there is no shortage of sporting similarities between the champions of Scotland and Austria.

Like the Parkhead side, Salzburg have a spending power and quality of player which places them in a different league from anything else their domestic division has to offer, many of whose traditional rivals have fallen upon hard times. Both sides are rather miffed to have to scuff around in the Europa League, rather than the Champions League, and are experiencing birth pangs adjusting to the arrival of a new manager, not to mention contending with the sale of one of their star men to Southampton this summer for a fee in excess of £10 million.

Last season saw Salzburg canter to an Austrian league and cup double, their fifth top-flight league title in the last eight years racked up with fully eight weeks of the season to go, or as the locals put it "when snow was still on the ground". The 1994 Uefa Cup runners-up - they reached that final as Casino Salzburg - also had designs on the Europa League, winning all six of their group games prior to losing narrowly at the last-16 stage to FC Basel. It was all enough to win the club the not-so-coveted award of Best Sporting Progress at the European Club Association awards do this week, while the successful pressing style of head coach Roger Schmidt certainly wasn't missed by German giants Bayer Leverkusen. They attracted him to Germany, where he is currently utilising such tactics to guide Leverkusen to an early-season Bundesliga lead.

Adi Hutter, a former Salzburg player who is au fait with Schmidt's methods and took lowly Grödig all the way to the Europa League places last year, is the man tasked with carrying the whole thing on, but the real brains behind the operation is Ralf Rangnick, the German coach who is sports director at both Salzburg and their sister team in the Red Bull stable, RB Leipzig. While the consensus is that Salzburg aren't quite the same team this year - not least because Southampton spent £11.8m to buy the pacy Sadio Mane - it helps when your domestic competition is this feeble.

Although Malmo proved too strong for them in Champions League qualifying, the only team capable of keeping pace with Salzburg at the top of the Austrian Bundesliga thus far are newly-promoted minnows Wolfsberger AC, who they take on this afternoon. The likes of Rapid Vienna and Sturm Graz are well off the pace, while Austria Vienna sit last. Another club from the city, Austria Salzburg, set up by supporters disgruntled with Red Bull's money, is quietly working its way up through the lower divisions like AFC Wimbledon.

The main threats to Celtic's defence aren't difficult to pinpoint. The club is captained by 27-year-old Spanish striker, Jonathan Soriano, pictured, whose eight goals in the Europa League last time around earned him the golden boot in the competition. His strike partner Alan, from Brazil, is pacy and has quick feet, while Slovenian Kevin Klampl can inject further velocity to their attacks from midfield.

The similarities in status between the two clubs aren't lost on Thomas Flögel, the former Hearts player and Austria international midfielder who is director of youth at lower division Young Style Wienerberg. Having caught some of Celtic in their pre-season tour in Austria this summer, he reckons Ronny Deila's side will have their work cut out in midweek.

"Salzburg have lots of fast, technically good players so I think it will be a very hard game for Celtic," said Flögel. "Celtic do still have a chance if they play long, miss out the midfield and try to win the second balls. That is the way to make it difficult for Salzburg. Technically Salzburg are better than Celtic but from the physical side Celtic are strong and that is where they will have their chance."

Some teams may scoff at Uefa's second continental club competition but Salzburg hold aspirations of winning it and qualifying for the 2015-16 Champions League group stages that way. "They could win the Europa League outright but I would say they are not as strong as they were last year," said Flögel. "The Austrian League, apart from Salzburg, is average. All the players in the national team are not playing in Austria, they are playing abroad, in places like Germany and England."

One thing Salzburg is sure to be is an engaging addition to the itinerary for those bored of Celtic trips to the same old outposts. The birthplace of Mozart has a picturesque Old Town which is renowned for its baroque architecture and recognised as a UNESCO World heritage site.

For Flögel, it rings another bell with Scottish life. "It is quite similar to ­Edinburgh," the former Hearts player said.