Martin O'Neill stressed his desire to have both Arne Engels and Alistair Johnston available for Celtic's huge Champions League qualifiers later this month. 

O'Neill's comments came after Celtic began their Scottish Premiership title defence with a 1-0 win over Dundee, with Benjamin Nygren scoring the winner in the 52nd minute. 

Both Engels and Johnston played the duration of the encounter at Celtic Park, despite being linked with moves away from the Glasgow giants in this summer's transfer window.

Everton's interest in Johnston was revealed by O'Neill last week, which was reportedly rejected, while Engels is on the radar of Championship side West Ham. 

Ahead of facing Dundee, Celtic also found out their opponents in the Champions League play-off round, with Austrian champions LASK drawn against them, and O'Neill wants both Engels and Johnston to stay for the must-win two-legged tie. 

"Alistair and Arne both said to me that they would want to play in the game if things had not progressed," O'Neill said. 

"And I thought they did fine. Alistair has got a very strong mindset anyway.

"But you are naturally worried about transfer speculation in the background and how you might take the game into consideration psychologically as well as physically.

"But I thought they did fine. Alistair even moved over to left-back when Kieran came off. I cannot update you on any progress from the other day because I don't know any.

"Would I like to keep them for the play-off? Ideally, that would be brilliant. We wouldn't know if the other clubs would want to pursue that, if that was the case.

"I'm quite sure that anybody starting off in their own particular league would want their players in as soon as possible. But ideally, that would be great.

"I think that's one of the things we'll definitely be looking at. I seriously could not say for sure.

"You'd have to take the players' thoughts into consideration and maybe the other clubs. But overall, for me, selfishly, that would be great."

Monday's win saw both of Celtic's summer signings start, with club-record arrival Kasper Hogh given the nod up front while Camilo Duran played out on the right. 

Hogh failed to hit the target with his team-high total number of shots (four), but did have more touches in the opposition box (eight) than any other player on the pitch, while also winning four of his seven aerial duels. 

No player attempted more dribbles for Celtic than Duran's five, and he also won possession back for Celtic in the final third more than any of his team-mates (two). 

Celtic take on Kilmarnock before turning their attentions to the Champions League, and while O'Neill was impressed with his new additions, he expressed his desire to get more bodies in the building soon.

"Well, I'm hoping that we'll get some players in. That's the aim. We have two, and they're decent players for us, but we're striving to get some more in," O'Neill added. 

"I have a good idea of what we need – I should do. I'm the manager. But that wouldn't have made any difference to the result or performance tonight – I still know what we need.

"I still think that we are [getting closer to signings]. I will speak to Michael and see where we are.

"I spoke to him briefly. But it was just concentrating on the game. So tomorrow is another day."