Neil Lennon has leapt to the defence of Celtic after two days of verbal attacks from El-Hadji Diouf.
The Blackburn outcast made little impact in Sunday’s 2-2 draw at Ibrox but certainly can’t be accused of shyness off the pitch.
Diouf accused Scott Brown of being a nobody only interested in getting his opponent sent off and also claimed that the Celtic skipper had verbally abused his family.
Brown responded to those claims perfectly but before the ink was dry on that article Diouf was making allegations about Lennon’s behaviour in the tunnel at Ibrox.
Lennon never shirked out of a challenge as a player and wasn’t afraid to tackle Diouf’s claims yesterday and threw in a few jabs of his own at Sunday’s officials.
Brushing aside Diouf’s claims the Celtic boss said: “I look forward to seeing who he’s going to have a pop at tomorrow- maybe it will be John Clark the kitman or someone like that.
“He seems to have a daily column in the paper now. He had a lot to say for himself after the game but I’ll leave the taunts out of it. I just told him to keep quiet.
“There was a lot that went on in the game and these things should be left on the pitch, instead of telling everyone how hard done by he feels about it.
“You only get one side of the story from his point of view. I think that Scott has done enough now.”
Brown picked up a yellow card for his goal celebration at Ibrox- the second Celtic player to be punished this year.
Georgios Samaras’ leap into the fans at the Broomloan Road stand after opening the scoring in January was an obvious booking but Lennon’s was as mystified by Brown’s booking as the rest of the Celtic support.
The hoops boss added: “I thought Scott was terrific from start to finish and the goal was the icing on a top performance.
“I can’t understand for the life of my why he got booked. What’s the craic with that one? It’s the only criticism I would have of the referee.
“Georgios Samaras got booked for scoring and leaving the pitch in January. I saw Whittaker leave the pitch on Sunday after the penalty and there didn’t seem to be a yellow card for that. However, I’m not going down the line of criticising referees.
“I said after the game the big decisions in the game, he got the majority of them right.
“I was disappointed with the linesman’s decision on the Samaras offside as he was clearly yards onside. I don’t understand how he got that one wrong. Sometimes these things just happen.”
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I fail to understand why Scott Brown got a yellow card.
After scoring a brilliant goal he stood aloft in a cross like posture, quite motionless in exactly the same spot.
It was Diouf who was some ten metres from Brown that ventured towards the Celtic player enticing Brown to encourage profocation from the Celtic player.
Brown showed great tolerance. The Ref should have booked Diouf for his unprofessional behaviour.