Paul Tisdale appointed Celtic’s Head of Football Operations

Brendan, Paul Tisdale's been in post for about six or seven weeks now. Can you tell us about how that's working and how you hope that will be at the club going forward?

Yeah, I think it'll be a big benefit for us. Paul came in here during the summer to help. I obviously control a lot of the core performance of the team, the B team and everything else that goes around that, media, everything else. But there's a side that runs beside that, which is, for me, the strategic operation of the club. And I felt there was a gap there in that. So I wanted to bring someone in just to see how that would go. Paul, not only has he managed before, which gives me comfort, he knows what it's like to be in the shoes of a manager, but he also understands the business side. So I felt that having someone in to help support that organisation and a lot of the logistics that go on at that level, from recruitment to academy to admin, for me, a modern club needs that. And if you're going to progress, you need that operation. Because if I'm out on the pitch and doing all the stuff there, it still needs to go on down here. Clearly, the business side of the club has run immaculately. You only need to look at Celtic over many, many years. But from a strategy perspective, that was Paul's role. So he links in very closely with Michael and myself, along with Dermot, in terms of the strategy. And we obviously converse a lot, we speak a lot, and he will bring his strength to that role


How busy has he been in the recruitment team?

Been quite busy, yeah. Very clever up here, you know. It's always ongoing, isn't it? Even if we're not just looking for January, it's beyond. We get meetings this afternoon around our young players and looking at that strategy. So it's ongoing. I always say you can't wait for the future to plan for the future. You've got to be looking at it now to look forward, and the club's in a great place, we're in a great moment, but we have to always look forward. That is a part of his role, to oversee that and to make sure that we are in the best possible position as a football club to grow that department in order to get the best players in, so that we can perform