By Joe McHugh
There can be little doubt that Bobby Robson was greatly admired by Fergus McCann and could have had any job that he liked during McCann’s time at Celtic.
The summer of 1997 would appear to have been the closest that Celtic got to Robson but despite the offer from McCann the former England manager decided to take on a General Manager role at Barcelona to Louis van Gaal while Celtic eventually turned their attention to Jock Brown…
McCann, after two decades in North America, appeared to pick up on Robson during the 1993/94 season when he eventually ousted the Celtic dynasties of the Kelly’s and Whites.
LOU MACARI
During that season Celtic played Sporting Lisbon in the UEFA Cup with Frank Connor guiding the team to a 1-0 win in the first leg before new manager Lou Macari lost the return match 2-0 to a side featuring Jorge Cadete who would go on to feature heavily in McCann’s five years at Celtic.
Macari’s part-time confrontational management style was never going to last under McCann. Tommy Burns was chosen as Macari’s successor but from his North American background McCann was never comfortable with the managerial set up favoured in the UK where one man, the manager seemed to be the decision maker for every area of the club.
McCann and Burns both had their ambitions for Celtic but the route to get there was never shared. Paying out large sums of money for footballers, and to agents, made McCann uncomfortable with the fee and the terms of the deals for Phil O’Donnell and Tommy Johnson particularly irksome.
By the time of the Johnson deal in 1997 McCann was already looking at a new managerial model for Celtic with Robson’s success noted as manager of Barcelona after a similarly successful spell in charge of Porto.
BARCELONA
The interest in Robson was highlighted by the friendly that Celtic played with Barcelona in November 1996 although in typical McCann fashion there was threats to sue Barcelona for not sending their strongest team and Robson admitted that he was mystified as to why the game had taken place!
Despite winning three trophies including the Cup Winners Cup in 96/97 Robson was getting booted up stairs by Barca as they brought in the Ajax approach of Louis van Gaal who had made the Dutch side a Champions League force for the first time in twenty years.
As Burns was sacked by Celtic a new blueprint for management was unveiled featuring bold ambitious job titles leaning heavily towards the continental model, at the launch the names of Wim Jansen, Jock Brown and Eric Black seemed to be miles away.
Robson seemed unsure of his future but was popular at Barcelona. He knew all about Celtic’s interest but was perhaps unsure of McCann who had vowed to sell up and move on at the end of his five year Celtic plan.
In those days every summer seemed like a lifetime at Celtic, determined not to make mistakes and wary of media interest, McCann was in charge of everything from stadium redevelopment and managerial appointments while battling away against his detested agents and players who he clearly believed were working their ticket.
TEN-IN-A-ROW
As an outsider looking in Celtic, despite it’s potential and attractions wasn’t the most appealing of jobs as the club struggled to contain the then free-spending Rangers on their way to an inevitable ten-in-a-row as they brought in Jonas Thern, Sergio Porrini, Lorenzo Amoruso, Marco Negri and Rino Gatusso from Seria A plus other not so super superstars like Stale Stensaas, Tony Vidmar and Anti Niemi to help out Paul Gascoigne and Brian Laudrup with the focus set of European domination with Scotland virtually assured…
The General Manager role didn’t really appeal to Robson, he was a tracksuit man rather than figurehead but without doubt he could have had whatever role he wanted at Celtic.
Robson opted for the General Manager’s job at Barcelona but was back in management a year later at PSV Eindhoven before his homecoming to St James Park and Newcastle United after a lifetime in the game spent away from his native North East.
With Robson out of contention McCann found time running against him as a new season approached without a manager, with Paul McStay retired through injury and various issues going on with the supporters golden boys.
JOCK BROWN
Pierre van Hooijdonk had already left for Nottingham Forest, Jorge Cadete was having a breakdown while Paolo di Canio was discovering little problems in his contract.
Throwing Jock Brown in as trouble-shooter/General Manager poured petrol on the flames but one way or another Wim Jansen fashioned a team out of it all to take the title from Rangers before slipping off into the horizon.
Who knows what Robson would have made of Celtic if he had taken up the offer to come to the club?
NEWCASTLE
In his final management job he took Newcastle United into the Champions League which in this day seems an incredible achievement. Finishing third, fourth and fifth in the Premiership wasn’t good enough for the Newcastle directors who decided to sack Robson and replace him with Graeme Souness.
Since sacking Robson in 2004 Newcastle have had ten different managers including Kevin Keegan, Joe Kinnear, Chris Hughton and Alan Shearer last season.
One of Robson’s last actions as Newcastle manager was to savage the Rangers support during a pre-season tournament at Newcastle.
Alan Shearer was the target for a Rangers team including Fernando Ricksen and Boab Malcolm with the travelling support upto their usual hostilities.
Robson said: “I also don’t like filthy chants and there were a lot of unclean mouths making filthy chants. Alan Shearer doesn’t have to put up with that situation. I wasn’t having that, having them screaming unpleasantries at him, so I got him out of that muck.”
Ahead of his time as ever.