Neil Lennon

I do love a good challenge tbf, Aberdeen gave us the best challenges of the 9iar years.

Good memories.

 

Yeah, they might be told to find another club, and be given a free transfer to get them off the wage bill, but it's very unlikely a player would be expected to walk out on a contract. And if they were their agent would be pretty * negligent to tell then to agree to it without another club lined up.

 

So happy this thread is here now.

 

I don't think anyone reasonable expects under-performing players to walk away from lucrative contracts just because it hasn't worked out

Scott Allan as an example was being paid £10k per week with us and seen it out his whole contract. Everyone knew he would never get a similar amount elsewhere.

Another example is big Bobo on £32k a week and Lawwell tried to do all in his power to unsettle him to leave to a club paying him less. Most Celtic fans I've heard back Bobo's stance.

I think there's an inconsistency with those that expected Lennon to resign. We demand loyalty from players & managers and get outraged when people leave, like Rodgers or Tierney as 2 recent examples.

We can't reasonably expect managers & players to be unfailingly loyal to us but also expect them to leave if things go * up. It's a bit duplicitous actually; loyalty is a 2-way street.

We gave him a contract, it didn't work out, pay him his money and bring another manager in. That's how any respectable club operates.

 

I fully agree about the incompetence of the board but you are giving Lennon an easy ride.

He said in November that, if things got worse, he would walk away. There is no doubt that things got worse (IMO narrow wins against teams in the bottom half of the table and beating a team from a lower league on penalties are hardly impressive). How much worse can you get than losing to Ross County again! and let's not pretend that he chose to "resign" yesterday - it was a face saving sacking.

He was saying a few weeks ago that he wouldn't resign and the board would have to sack him - directly contradicting what he said before.

He has taken responsibility for nothing this season.

As you say, if he was contractually due a certain payoff, then the board should honour that.

However, it is clear that Lennon simply lied to us - he never had any intention of resigning and was quite prepared to keep dragging the club down until the board were forced to act and pay him off.

By all means - hammer the board but let's not pretend that Lennon is honourable and has acted out of anything other than self-interest this season.

 

Fair comment that. I forgot he said he'd hold his hands up and walk away.

No-one comes out of this looking good. Lennon's reputation is tarnished. The board are miles out their depth and the players who have been half-arsed all season won't be looked back on fondly either.

 

Got sent a WhatsApp there from a good source:

That's from the same guy that leaked Scott Robertson's move to Donnie Rovers.

 

Just seen the statement in which Desmond said this muppet would be difficult to replace lol * me man

 

I'm not saying NL is blameless but there is more wrong than just the manager. We spent a lot of money in the summer and I would argue not one of them has been a success.

I don't think the board would have gave him such a long time to turn things around if they held him completely responsible for our failings.

Why has Scott Brown and many of his former players like Kelvin Wilson, Wanyama and Van Dyle all spoke so highly of him if he's always been *?

Ajer has been one of our better players this season. He was absolutely rotten for a number of games at the beginning of the season. He was also one of the players like Christie that started to believe there own hype.

 

I've not absolved NL at all. I've been calling on him to be removed for months. The fact is so many of our players let us down because they weren't trying but NL should have be sacked months ago because it was obvious and it's easier to replace the manager than all the players.

Doesn't change the fact Celtic fans shouldn't forgive players that through the ten in a row dream away.

 

But players do actively transfer clubs and take lesser contracts, that’s indisputable. Not always of course. Like you say, Allan and Balde both waited theirs out, but it definitely happens.

With regards to Lennon, all I’m saying is it’s a unique situation. He got the job because he claims to be one of us, otherwise we wouldn’t have touched him. * the board, but even from their point of a view they’ve given a guy that’s finished in management one big shot he absolutely wasn’t due, and the money to go with it.

The decent thing to do in that situation would be do resign when you cannot do the job properly anymore.

If he was an otherwise successful manager uprooting his life and career to move to Celtic and it didn’t work out, far doos get the money your due. If your career is finished and we give you a dream opportunity don’t sit and rinse us for every penny when you can’t do it properly.

Fundamentally I agree the board should’ve sacked him and given him his money. The fact they didn’t doesn’t absolve him of blame.

If I was them I’d have sacked him, called him a greedy useless * and let him know I regret giving him the chance because he didn’t * deserve it.

 

Traffic cones could do a better job than our management team.HH

 

Maybe I didn’t phrase it well but I meant being sold in a transfer. So when I say walk away I mean giving up money.

The point I’m making is a player transferring back to an old club a taking a pay cut isn’t really looked at as a pay cut, it’s looked at as actually giving up a chunk of money.

When they get their contract they don’t look at the per week, they look at it as £5m over 5 years and when they move it becomes £3m over 5 years. i.e. they actively give up £2m.

Lennon was earning nothing until Celtic gave him an unbelievable opportunity. He earned 18 months of big money he had no reason to expect after his career nosedived. I would expect him to give up 6 months of money for the good of the club, like a player transferring out and giving up contracted money.

 

Funny how some people just after his "resignation" start to forget how he treated us fans this season. He lied to us, insulted our intelligence in every post-match interview, treated us with utter contempt, called us hysterical when we pointed out what will happen with him in power and that now really became true and then the way he always blamed everyone else for our failings and never stood to his mistakes. That's all things that mark a weak character and an ugly personality. A Celtic legend doesn't act like that and therefore I don't give a * about some morons in the media trying to make him one. He had a good career as a player and captain but to be a legend there's a little bit more needed like a proper character. He disrespected us fans to an amount this season that any supporter with some self-respect should stop idolizing him.

Now I can finally leave this thread at it's own and start ignoring this *

 

See Brown coming out with the usual the players have to take responsibility *,that tells me one of two things they either didn,t try or their *.

Will be interesting to see how they perform under kennedy cant see them becoming better players over night so if we see an improvement we can only presume they stopped trying for lennon.

So that takes me back to Browns comments about taking responsibility,to me he,s saying we stopped trying.(if we see an improvement under Kennedy)I know it happens in football but to think these players stopped trying this season(10)sickens me.I would love to see Kennedy drop the majority of them as a statement of intent.

 

There’s no separation of responsibility between Lennon and the board here - they are both absolutely responsible.

This ain’t football manager where you resign and receive nothing, or are sacked and receive a full payoff. You talk to one another and come to a settlement arrangement. That’s what should’ve taken place back in October.

I’m certain that this didn’t come down to money on the boards side. As much as they deserve criticism for some shocking decision making, they’re not absolute idiots in a financial sense. The payoff required to terminate Lennon’s contract - even if no settlement could be agreed - is tiny in comparison to the financial damage that’s already been done by keeping him.

For me, Lennon didn’t walk because this was his last big payday. The board didn’t sack him because they genuinely believed he was just a productive Zoom call away from turning things around.

They both * up, and now both Lawwell and Lennon leave with their reputations massively tarnished .

 

Perhaps Brooney’s referring to a group of players who have chucked it (not the whole squad)... which would fit in with Lenny’s comments too... and which would fit in with what we’ve see on the park.

I’m not absolving Lenny of his share of the blame for this season, but I have seen with my own eyes that there are players who are just as culpable for this *-storm of a season.

We can criticise Neil for not having the managerial skills, but we could never accuse him of chucking it!

 

I don't buy in to this " the players stopped trying " . In a season where they could have won 10 IAR, a once in a lifetime opportunity, a chance to further engrave their names in history of the Club if they havent done so already . To just stop trying ? Not to mention some of them were prob on big bonuses to get 10 IAR. The failing this season started last season, all the warnings were there. Poor performances and scraping results up to last Xmas, they went to Dubai and had a heart to heart according to Lennon. We then put a run of wins in and scoring for fun with Eddy and Griff upfront, that and with the Huns imploding it looked better for us then along came Covid ending the season. If we take Brown as an example, knowing how much he has achieved at the Club and how much 10 IAR meant to him being Captain, does anyone think he just stopped trying ? Poor coaching, poor fitness training, poor preparation for games, no tactics of note all come down to the manager and coaching staff.

 

He was a great player for us and a decent manager when he's had little competition, he will unfortunately be remembered for this season and for me is a sad ending for him I also feel he brought a lot of this season on himself, I wish him all the best but I'll struggle to get over this season anytime soon

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