Joe Hart was written off before arriving at Celtic, yet proved the doubters wrong by clinching seven trophies during his 153 appearances for the club. 

Now after gauging the response to Kasper Schmeichel's recent introduction to the Parkhead locker room, Alistair Johnston believes the veteran goalkeeper will follow in Hart's foot steps and "prove a lot of people wrong".

Schmeichel, at almost 38-years-old, is five months older than the man he is proceeding in the Celtic net.

Hart hung up his gloves for good this summer following the latest Double-winning campaign and leaves a huge hole given his impressive exploits.

However, from what Johnston has witnessed so far, he's confident that the Dane is a ready-made replacement and can still produce the elite-levels that helped Leicester City win the English Premier League title against all-odds in 2016.

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"It is massive," the Canadian internationalist told Sky Sports when asked about the importance of forging a strong bond with the team's new No.1 shot-stopper. 

"Replacing Joe not only on the pitch but off it is really difficult. I think the manager did a great job with Kasper. He is a man with a ton of experience just like Joe. He is a big presence in the locker room. He still has plenty of quality and we saw that throughout pre-season. We have all been happily surprised with the level that he still has. I think he is going to prove a lot of people wrong just the same as Joe did when he came up here.

"A lot of people wrote him off and not because they doubted his quality just because he had been out of the limelight a little bit. He's been playing in France and Belgium for the past two years so he was kind of out of sight and out of mind. Now he's going to remind everybody of how much a quality goalkeeper he is.

"We have seen how good he is with his feet and some of the saves he made even just in my first two days at training have been unbelievable. I'm excited to build that relationship and trust with him as it is so important that you have a goalkeeper that instils confidence in the backline."

After being blown away by Celtic's performances during their USA tour, Johnston has urged the Hoops to build on last season successes. To do that, he would love to see the Glasgow giants showcase themselves more positively in the Champions League. 

"We are coming off the tail-end of a very good pre-season just based on results," he explained. 

"Not only that if you watched the way the boys played it was impressive. I was blown away with it. I got to go and see the Manchester City match in person. I was over there in North Carolina, so I popped in and watched that one. You could see that the guys were taking on board exactly what the manager was asking.

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"It is another year under Brendan under our belt and you could see the ideas really formulating. The idea is now to push on and be strong domestically. That's always our bread and butter. At the same time, there is a new Champions League format and it is going to be exciting as there are eight matches now. That gives us two extra matches to potentially give us a shot of making the next round.

"It's an exciting year in that sense. For us, it's all about being strong domestically and taking another step in Europe. We know that we have a team that can do it. We have shown it already in pre-season that we're ready for that. That is the plan."