Neil Lennon jumped to the defence of the Celtic board after Chris Sutton questioned and criticised the disastrous recruitment policy of the club.
Despite a bank balance sitting north of £80m Celtic crashed out of the Champions League with a woefully under prepared squad that means that there will be no £40m Champions League pay out this season.
Michael Nicholson’s plan to weaken the first team squad started in January with the sale of Kyogo Furuhashi and continued in July when Nicolas Kuhn was sold to Como.
Neither player was replaced despite the additional problem of losing Jota to a long term injury.
With Nicholson working on the sale of Adam Idah the perfect storm saw Celtic lose out to Kairat Almaty which prompted the signings of Michel-Ange Balikwisha and Marcelo Saracchi.
Idah missed today’s match as Celtic tried to push through a transfer to Swansea, again the priority of Nicholson is always to sell off players regardless of the impact on the squad.
Lennon has twice been promoted from caretaker to permanent manager by Peter Lawwell, in the Sky Sports studio it seems that he still hankers for another stint as he put up a shallow defence of Celtic’s recruitment record
Lennon:
Maybe the players that Brendan’s wanted of that quality, the ones who can take the club from the knockout rounds to the last 16 or even the quarters, they cost money. They’re quality players, but they’re not coming to Scotland unless it’s Champions League football.
But if I’m an agent of a player Celtic wanted, and he’s worth £12-15 million, I could take him to La Liga, or maybe Serie A. I can take him to Scotland, but the carrot in Scotland is Champions League football. Glasgow can be a hard sell.
Ben Nygren, Balikwisha and Saracchi all signed up without the guarantee of Champions League football, there are plenty of players across Europe that will jump at being paid £20,000 a week, plating in front of 60,000 fans every fortnight and the platform to follow Matt O’Riley and Kuhn to richer clubs.
Sutton hit back with:
Neil, you’re making excuses. No, you’re making excuses. The bottom line is Celtic had to get replacements in for these players. Other clubs get it done, and it’s just too easy to say, well, let’s just wait and see.
Other clubs get it done. To lose Kyogo and not replace him… who knows? Had Celtic kept Kyogo, they could have won the cup final.
To actually sell Kyogo while still in the Champions League, was that the right thing to do? That’s where supporters question the club hierarchy’s ambition.
It’s not just enough to stay ahead of Rangers. The supporters want more than that.
With a stadium capacity less than half the size of Celtic Park, Club Brugge sold four players this summer for 80m euros and bought five replacements in for 40m euros. A bigger surplus that Celtic but with a refreshed and ambitious squad.
The new signings were settled in to get through two rounds of Champions League qualifiers with Brugge taking part in the group stage for the seventh time in eight seasons.
The Irish miser wants both of his clubs to be the same size. Celtic to be the size of Shamrock Rovers. He’s going the right way about it.
GET RID OF DESMOND – SACK THE BOARD.
Lennie backing his masters
I said recently when Celtic have a bad result the media bring in and reward those who have harmed the club. Not one Celtic fan is interested in Lennon’s view.
Lennon messed up 10 in a row. Never forget.
Imagine asking THE ALKIE BOOZE JOCKEY,our version of Buckfast Bomber Brown,none of the 2 of them sober enough to string 2 words together.
What Neil Lennon went through for Celtic should never be forgotten, he should never have been put in charge after the cup final
Lennon was and is, Liewell’s man. This was him making a pitch for his 3rd stint in the dugout. Lennon & Maloney are Liewell’s dream team – two cheap and compliant ‘yes’ men, just the way he likes them….
Lennon can speculate all he wants on the why’s and why not’s that players don’t come to Scotland/Celtic.
The simple fact of the matter is that Parasite Pete’s glove puppet,or anyone else in authority at Celtic Park does not come out and explain what any difficulties are being encountered.
The bottom line is,as enunciate by the zoo Ahead Eagles CEO,that we are amateurish in our approach when it comes to transfer dealings.
To be told we should take a leaf out of the huns transfer dealings strategy should tell us everything we need to know about these 5th columnists in Paradise.
Just say NO to Celtic merchandise, you know it makes sense .