On Wednesday an emotional Peter Lawwell told Celtic fans that morals, integrity and humility were at the core of the club.
After sanctioning a costly five star training trip to Dubai, Lawwell has put the club’s u-18 squad on Furlough. While highly paid first team players self isolate the youngest employees at the club have effectively been laid off, unable to even contact the club to discuss training and working out while at home.
Some might see it as a PR disaster but the events of the first fortnight of 2021 are far more than cosmetic, they give the appearance of a club that has totally lost anchor and racing towards calamity.
In an attempt to address the issues Lawwell made a five minute video interview apparently aimed at supporters, after a brief laboured apology he then went on to explain at length the reasons why the trip went ahead. With Scotland moving rapidly towards Lockdown the CEO could have cancelled the Dubai trip at any stage.
Now a new equally damaging report has emerged- putting the morals and humility of the club in question.
Stephen McGowan of the Daily Mail reports:
Celtic’s Under-18s manager Darren O’Dea informed 18 academy players they would be furloughed during a series of Zoom calls.
All professional football beneath the SPFL Championship has been suspended by the Joint Response Group, with updated guidance from the Scottish Government and sportscotland warning that all non-contact activity in groups of 12 and over must also come to a halt.
Initially put in place for three weeks, subject to review, players have been banned from training or playing games. And Celtic will take advantage of the coronavirus job retention scheme to let taxpayers pick up the tab for 80 per cent of their salary, while continuing to pay the remaining 20 per cent.
However sources close to the players told to stay at home criticised Celtic’s decision to furlough young hopefuls on modest salaries after paying thousands to fly first-team players and management to Dubai for a controversial warm-weather training camp in the midst of a global pandemic.
Parkhead chief executive Peter Lawwell now admits that was a mistake and has apologised to fans in a video released online.
And one relative of an Under-18s player – speaking on the condition of anonymity – told Sportsmail: ‘People are struggling to understand why Celtic would go to Dubai during a pandemic and squander all that money on warm-weather training and then put young boys earning a fraction of the sum of the first-team players on the government scheme. That doesn’t seem right.’
After 2 minutes 30 seconds Gerry McCulloch put the morals question to the CEO:
There’s been accusations in the media of arrogance, lack of morals, integrity, almost questioning the club’s values. What do you say in response?
I certainly don’t see that or agree with that and I actually think that’s unfair. I do understand people questioning the decision to go, but the values this club operates and standards we have in terms of integrity, respect and humility are there.
The traditions and standards and values of the club have been developed over the years and we haven’t compromised on them.