LEIGH Griffiths has admitted that he thought he had scuppered his chances of being involved in Celtic’s final Ladbrokes Premiership match and the William Hill Scottish Cup final with his “moment of madness” during the Partick Thistle game last week.

Griffiths scored his side’s opening goal and then helped set up their second in the 2-0 win over Hearts at Parkhead yesterday to ensure they completed their 38 game league programme undefeated and became “Invincibles”.

However, the striker feared he might be dropped for the league match and the cup final after publicly mouthing off at his manager Brendan Rodgers when he was substituted at Firhill last Thursday evening.

Asked if he expected to be left out of the starting line-up yesterday, he said: “Aye, kind of. It was one of those ones where I didn’t want to be going off”.

Rodgers had been woken up by an apologetic text message from the contrite player the morning after the incident and Griffiths, who took his tally for the 2016/17 campaign to 18 with his goal yesterday, was relieved when he agreed to put the matter behind them.

“My text was kind of early I must admit,” he said. “But I just wanted to get my message across that I shouldn’t have done what I did. It was disrespectful towards him, towards my team mates, towards the fans.

“It was no disrespect to Scotty (Sinclair) coming on. The gaffer was wanting to get his goals tally up and try and see the game out. In no way, shape or form did I mean any disrespect to the management staff, the players or the fans. It was a moment of madness from myself and I apologised for it.

“I got the stare of death on the bench. That was enough to tell me enough was enough. But after the game the gaffer drew a line under it and we moved on. Thankfully, we got the win today and we can go and celebrate.”

It was the fourth Scottish title success which Griffiths, who has had to play understudy to first choice forward Moussa Dembele this season, has been involved in, but the 26-year-old reckons this one is the sweetest.

He remembered the abuse that he and his team mates had taken after their embarrassing defeat to part-time minnows Lincoln Red Imps in Rodgers’s first competitive match in charge and is happy they have silenced their critics.

“This one is a bit more special than others ones,” he said. “Every title is great, but as long as we didn’t get beat we knew we were going to be invincible. That was the message going out at the start of the game. It is a great achievement for everybody at the club. We have now got one big push to go next week.

“After the first game against Lincoln Red Imps in the Champions League qualifier there were a few fans who weren’t nice to the boys, but the gaffer told us to be calm and stressed it was our first game as players. We knew we were going to be up against it at times, but credit to us. It shows what kind of mentality and character we have got in that dressing room downstairs.”

“I think after the split was made we had two really tough trips, Ibrox and Pittodrie. I thought if we could get through them we had a really good chance. We started really well against Aberdeen, got the three goals early on and that was comfortable enough for us. After that game we really thought we could do it in the changing room.

“It was frustrating in the first half. Hearts sat in. But we knew it was coming. We knew we had to be patient. In the end, it was an easy 2-0 win for us.”