Scott Brown said Celtic always knew they had the goals in their team to make sure they qualified for the Champions League group stages.

An 8-4 aggregate win over Astana put the Scottish champions into the elite round of the competition, with a 5-0 first leg win giving them comfort before a 4-3 defeat in Kazakhstan.

The Celtic captain admitted his side hadn't been at their best but said that the attack was always likely to ensure progress in an end-to-end encounter he compared to a basketball game.

"The first game at Celtic Park was phenomenal for us but it wasn't so good coming over here," he said. "We knew we would score goals and would always make it hard for anyone we played against.

"It was an exciting game for the neutral but not so much for us.

"If you look at the shots on target I think it was like 19 or 20 shots so it was like a game of basketball and it's not like us to be perfectly honest. Usually we are very tight and we were a bit too open today."

Brown conceded that the away encounter was difficult but said that underlined the importance of the strong home performances in continental competition.

"European football is never going to be easy and for us to win 5-0 at home it shows you what we need to do sometimes," he said.

"Going away from home you never know what you can expect and coming here it's always a hard game on an astroturf pitch.

"We found it hard in the past but we're a little bit disappointed with ourselves that we didn't manage to get a draw at the end."