Simon Donnelly has admitted that he never worked again with players of the quality that he left at Celtic in 1999.
The forward played a full part as Tommy Burns and Wim Jansen turned Celtic around during Fergus McCann’s lively period running the club.
Henrik Larsson, Paolo di Canio, Paul Lambert, Marc Reiper, Paul McStay, Andy Thom and John Collins were among his Celtic team-mates before he took advantage of freedom of contract and a lucrative deal with Sheffield Wednesday.
Donnelly’s career never kicked on in England but as he looks back on his playing days there are plenty of characters and memories to recall.
“It wasn’t as if I was a flash in the pan,” he told the Daily Record looking back on a debut under Lou Macari. “But that’s the perception because I moved on at 24.
“I’m always being told that I could have done this or that. But I had seven years at Celtic before getting the opportunity to play in the English Premiership.
“From the minute I left the Celtic dressing-room I didn’t play with the same quality of player ever again.
“I could have stayed at Celtic, there was a good deal on the table but I was still a young guy and I didn’t like some of the attention I would get in Glasgow. In Sheffield I lived in a village called Dore and nobody knew me. That was the first time I’d experienced that from the age of 17.
“The football just wasn’t what I’d experienced before at Celtic. In terms of quality, that can’t be touched but I’ve had a decent career and I’m very happy with it.”
Alongside Tom Boyd he was the only player to play at the old Celtic Park and the newly constructed 60,000 seater.
Macari’s early comparisons with Kenny Dalglish didn’t do Donnelly any favours but he survived three changes of manager before leaving Celtic just as Dalglish was coming in as manager.