It was out of my control, players went on record wanting to leave- Lennon launches new attack on Celtic squad

Neil Lennon has launched a fresh attack on last season’s Celtic squad while failing to take any responsibility for the multiple failings. 

After more than a year out of management the Irishman has taken charge of Omonio Nicosia but still seems preoccupied with avoiding any personal blame for what went wrong in his final season at Celtic. 

Last summer Lennon made very direct criticisms of Leigh Griffiths while maintaining a line that players wanted to quit the club ahead of the attempt to win a 10th successive title. 

That excuse first surfaced after losing 2-1 at home to Ferencvaros in the Champions League Second Qualifying Round but despite five weeks remaining in the transfer window no-one left the club. 

Even with the distraction of Boli Bolingoli forcing the postponement of two SPFL matches Celtic took 25 points out of 27 from their first nine fixtures as well as qualifying for the group stage of the Europa League. 

After the October international break disaster struck as Celtic lost four successive home matches for the first time since the fifties. A depleted Sparta Prague side hammered Celtic 4-1 home and away in the Europa League with Ross County ending a four year run without defeat in a domestic cup tie. 

Peter Lawwell and Dermot Desmond stood beside Lennon, backing him to turn things round but things continued to go downhill until a second defeat from Ross County resulted in the manager resigning. 

Speaking to The Sun about last season Lennon said: 

There were a lot of things out of my control, like not being able to go and look at players. You were recruiting them from computer screens because everything was shut. 

Could I have got more of a grip on the players? I wouldn’t say that I’m a thorough disciplinarian but we do set high values — and some of the players fell below that. 

But, players were also suffering from something that they hadn’t experienced before. So, it was very difficult to point fingers at anyone. 

There were a few who said on record they wanted to go. They made that clear but they couldn’t because of the environment we found ourselves in. 

As the initial run in the SPFL demonstrated the Celtic squad were still capable of delivering results, when things went wrong Lennon was unable to make the changes with the blame for losing to Ferencvaros from their boss hanging over the squad. 

Little has been said from inside the squad about what went wrong but last week Ryan Christie denied to Football Scotland that players were desperate to get away: 

It was tough because, number one, I don’t think anyone had stated they were absolutely desperate to leave at that point. 

A few people had maybe had offers in like Premier League or elsewhere that was promising for them. 

It was so early in the season where it’s a bit different for Celtic when you have such important games at the start of the season that it means you have to be focussed straight away. That’s when the transfer market takes over a little bit at the start of the season. 

Did it have to be said? I’m not so sure. I think everyone was desperate to get a result. Everyone in our squad was firing on all cylinders to try and get through. 

Had we got into the Champions League that season I’m sure that would have steadied some players’ heads about leaving because that’s an attraction itself. 

People probably look back at those comments now and think, ‘That’s where it started going wrong so early’ but we took it as a minor blip, it was frustrating but it was still early and in our minds we were still thinking we’ll go on to have a successful season. 

Christie and Odsonne Edouard went through a full pre-season under Ange Postecoglou, they played until August 29 before moving on to Bournemouth and Crystal Palace without their commitment or attitude being questioned. 

Kris Ajer also left last summer but according to many he was one of the best players last season, holding together a defence that featured Chris Jullien, Shane Duffy and Nir Bitton with only Stephen Welsh showing any form and consistency when finally brought in. 

Lennon gave Tony Ralston one appearance last season, preferring Ajer, Jeremy Frimpong, Hatem Abd Elhamed then Jonjoe Kenny ahead of Ralston who was fit and available throughout the season.