No impact- O’Neill denies that boycott effected Celtic players

Martin O’Neill believes that the boycott invite from the Celtic Fans Collective had no impact on his players.

Celtic normally give out a match attendance midway through the second half of matches but there was no figure given for the cup tie at home to Dundee.

Unofficially a crowd of 24,120 seems credible, from the television coverage the 60,000 capacity stadium was less than half full.

O’NEILL TAKES THE HIT ON NICHOLSON’S DECISION

Since Michael Nicholson decided to suspend the Green Brigade at the start of November what little atmosphere that there was at Celtic Park has quickly eroded.

Nicholson and his executive colleagues have sucked the life out of any atmosphere with supporters turning up mainly out of habit.

Sitting in third place in what should be a one horse race isn’t a good look.

Especially when Nicholson had £70m to spend in January and decided against spending in order to gift HMRC another bumper Corporation Tax payment.

Celtic made a huge profit in the summer transfer window, a chunk of that will go out the door when the 2025/26 accounts are finalised.

Dundee fans out-sung the home support throughout last night’s match, there certainly wasn’t a 12th man in the stands as O’Neill knew during his first stint as manager at the turn of the century.

The Celtic Way covered last night’s post match media conference.

QUESTION: Do you think the fact that there weren’t as many people in the stands today played any part at all in that first 90 minutes?

O’NEILL:

No, I don’t think so. I don’t think so at all. I think it’s just that that was the nature of it.

We kind of knew that there beforehand. And also, for instance, I don’t think that the cup games are in the season tickets. So it’s expensive to travel.

You know, you’re talking about a 5.30 kick-off on a Saturday evening. And for instance, if supporters were travelling from Ireland, they would find that really difficult. So yeah, so I was pleased with the crowd.

I was pleased with the number that did turn up. And yeah, I’m naturally delighted to be in there.

There are likely to have been thousands of fans that bought tickets for the match but decided against attending.

On Wednesday Celtic face Livingston in the SPFL. In similar circumstances a crowd of around 40,000 can be expected- plus the return of the STAND UP IF YOU HATE THE BOARD chanting.

There has been no comment from Brian Wilson or Nicholson after last night’s match.