The elusive Martin O’Neill radio interview

Martin O’Neill gave a live interview to Track Radio on the day that it was announced that he was the permanent Celtic manager.

At 12 noon Celtic delivered what seemed like a rushed announcement that made no mention of his backroom team.

There was no in-house interview with the ‘new’ manager but Track Radio appeared to have an advance arrangement to speak to O’Neill.

Launched last month, the London based station covers music and sport with Mark Pougatch on their Drive Time show the biggest name on the station.

O’Neill gives very little away in any interview.

INTERVIEWING MARTIN O’NEILL

If he stumbles into something of interest he tends to quickly backtrack. Often a transcript from O’Neill can contain complete contradictions.

O’Neill wasn’t throwing about any headlines. The interviewer probably did no more than 15 minutes preparations, the World Cup seemed to be of as much interest as Celtic affairs.

O’Neill did admit that he hadn’t yet been on holiday. With Celtic starting pre-season training on June 26 he’ll need to move fast for a break after a very hectic last eight months.

Asked about the importance of recruitment going into the Champions League Play Off O’Neill said:

Absolutely, you’ve nailed it. It’s exactly right. We get a two-legged qualification game come the end or towards the end of August time. We will have started our season – we will be into it by a couple of matches – but the teams that we are likely to face will have had summer times and games in front of us.

And it’s always – I even felt this going back 20-odd years ago when I was in charge at Celtic—that teams you felt you could definitely beat in, let’s say, early November, you would find really difficult to beat in, let’s say, the second or third week in August because of the match advantages they would have over you.

So yeah, it’s fraught with difficulty in that sense. Celtic failed last year to make it out, you know, and probably in two games that they would have been expected to go through. So yeah, I would be concerned, but as you say, excited at the same time that there’s an opportunity for that.

The issues of assistants, specifically Shaun Maloney and Mark Fotheringham is going to dominate the coming days.

Until that issue is resolved it will be difficult to see what direction Celtic are moving in.

Maloney and Fotheringham were critical to O’Neill’s success last season. Something that he often acknowledged, coaches half his age had given him a fresh energy.

Three weeks have been lost since Celtic won the Scottish Cup.

There are no signs that the Celtic have made any progress with the key appointments needed for a modern club.

Whether the title is Head of Football Operations or anything else Paul Tisdale hasn’t been replaced.

A multitude of issues require to be addressed, in his Celtic TV interview Brian Wilson failed to answer anything worthwhile.