Steve Clarke has claimed that he never had any contact with Celtic with the club dealing directly with the SFA over the non-release of players for next week’s international friendly in Turkey.
Greg Taylor, David Turnbull and Tony Ralston would almost certainly have been in the squad- instead they will be in Australia with Celtic facing Sydney City on Thursday morning followed by a friendly against Everton on Sunday November 20.
Normally international sides have control over players but next week’s friendlies aren’t on the FIFA calendar with Celtic putting club before country.
Asked about the Celtic decision when he named his squad this morning, Clarke told The Sun:
I have to say I’m disappointed in that decision. Celtic had no discussions with me. They told the SFA that would not be making their players available. They are not compelled to release players for this game and they have chosen to do that.
Were Celtic right to withhold players from the Scotland squad
No, always a great honour to represent the SFA
Yes, Celtic comes first every time. Great decision, at last
Clarke has named a 23 man squad for the match in Turkey but can expect a large number of call-offs with Hearts players expected to be called up including Barrie McKay, Steven Kingsley and Andy Halliday.
The Australia tournament has been organised and known publicly for the longest time .It’s not as if Celtic FC organised the trip down under 10days ago ! The governing bodies are at fault here ,in true traditional , incompetent style . This is blind Willie McTell stuff ,for god’s sake .
Exactly… Was it known that there would have been the possibility of an international match when this trip was being arranged? If so and the club were not informed therefore allowing them freedom to plan whatever they wanted. Everyone has known about this tour for ages.. The other mob were supposed to be involved initially… Why in that case did the SFA not speak up when the dates were arranged? Even if they thought that Scotland would have qualified? And as soon as they were eliminated and there was this possibility WHY did they not speak up therefore avoiding this “issue”??!
He’s disappointed? Did he really believe Celtic were going to release players to Scotland? Must be very dim!