Ange Postecoglou explains coaching restructure

Darren O’Dea has joined Stephen McManus as joint coach of the Celtic B team.

The coaching set up at the B team has been a bit sketchy with the club announcing the departure of Tommy McIntyre last week even though he hadn’t been involved with the B squad since the start of the season.

McManus stepped up to work with the first team when John Kennedy was caretaker, last season he retained that coaching role but is now working with the B team who are playing in the Lowland League for the second season running.

Explaining the new set up to the Celtic website, Ange Postecoglou said:

As I have said before, I was keen to restructure our coaching set-up, with a hugely important element of this being the development of a close link between the first team and B Team coaching structures as we look to get that conveyer belt of talent going between the B Team directly up to the first team.  

I wanted a really strong connection to the development of our B Team and Stephen, with his knowledge of our current first-team philosophy and demands, will be ideal in this role.

Darren too already has that great experience of working with our young players and an affinity with the B Team which I know will be invaluable to us.

He is also someone with the knowledge of what it takes to be part of the Celtic first-team and the way in which we work at that level.

The B team switched to Colts tonight to beat their Livingston counterparts 3-0 in the SPFL Trust Trophy tonight with goals from Adam Brooks, Bosun Lawal and Ben Quinn. Almost all of the squad is eligible to play in the UEFA Youth League which Celtic will be involved in next month.

Postecoglou’s plans for the B team are ambitious but one serious flaw is that home matches are played on the artificial pitch at Airdrie’s Excelsior Stadium.