Rafa Benitez has apparently ruled himself out of contention to become the next manager of Celtic.
The Spaniard quit his job in China in December and was instantly linked with Celtic despite Neil Lennon being in place.
There is no direct mention of Celtic in the extract from a Times interview published in The Sun but with such a pedigree many Celtic fans would be looking for the former Liverpool and Real Madrid boss to at least be informally sounded out.
The approach and appointment of Brendan Rodgers in 2016 shows that in the right circumstances the job of managing Celtic still carries appeal.
In March 2016 Benitez took on the Newcastle job as they headed for relegation and stayed around in the Championship to begin the rebuilding process.
The Sun reports:
In an interview with The Times, Benitez dismissed being linked with Celtic as he explained what he wants from his next challenge.
The former Newcastle boss said: “A competitive team that allows you to challenge for trophies, or a project that allows you to improve and grow and do better.
“The priority is England. Why? Because obviously I like the Premier League and my family is here. I have a lot [of offers] from the Emirates, United States, Brazil, China, but I want to stay in Europe. And I want to stay in England.
“If it’s the right one, we can do it tomorrow but the project, the competitive team, is not there at the moment so we have to wait. But I don’t want to stay without working. I want to be on the pitch as soon as possible.”
Having already managed Liverpool, Chelsea and Newcastle in the EPL there are a very limited number of options open to Benitez who appears to have his sights set higher than keeping a club away from relegation.
Neil Lennon resigned as Celtic manager a month ago with no obvious sign of the club making a serious move to find a replacement.
Yesterday Dermot Desmond completed a seven part Q and A on the Celtic website that gave away very little about how close the club is to appointing a new manager.