Overlook me at your peril, says Lennon
Lennon admits he can see why Rangers splashed out £7m but says he had no intention of hijacking Ibrox bid
NEIL LENNON last night insisted that being underestimated as a manager only adds to his motivation to be as successful as possible in his second spell as Celtic boss. Following Sunday’s 2-0 Old Firm win at Ibrox, the Parkhead boss hit out at the ‘so-called experts’ — and some of Celtic’s own fans — for writing off his team after their disappointing Champions League exit to Romanian side CFR Cluj. Speaking as he picked up the Ladbrokes Premiership Manager of the Month award for August yesterday after a perfect start to the domestic season, Lennon (pictured) vowed his detractors will only spur him on as Celtic chase nine-in-a-row. ‘What do I have to do to be accepted here?,’ asked Lennon. ‘I don’t know, but sometimes that gives you a bit of an edge — and that’s good because you should never get comfortable in
I think we’re strong. I’m pleased with the signings we have made
IN the highly unlikely scenario that he was Rangers manager, Neil Lennon admits he would have shelled out £7million to sign Ryan Kent — regardless of the outcome of Sunday’s Old Firm match.
however, when the Celtic boss looks at the attacking options now within his own dressing room, he says it never crossed his mind to take the advice of former team-mate Chris Sutton and try to hijack the Liverpool winger’s move to Ibrox.
Satisfied with the signings he has made this summer — including landing former £16million wide man Mohamed elyounoussi on loan from Southampton — Lennon claims to have zero interest in the transfer goings-ons across the city, and he believes the window which has just shut more than addressed the concerns of Celtic fans over ‘downsizing’ by the Parkhead board.
even so, asked if Steven Gerrard would still have spent the money on landing Kent had his team won the derby, instead of losing 2-0, the Northern Irishman said: ‘Probably! I would have! Did it cross my mind to sign him for Celtic? No! Why would I?
‘I have Mikey Johnston, James Forrest, Marian Shved, I’ve got elyounoussi, Scott Sinclair, Jonny hayes and Lewis Morgan. We’re covered in that area. We have a front six that can do serious damage.
‘I’ve no interest in what Rangers are doing — especially off the back of a great performance and win (at Ibrox).
‘I can’t control what other teams do, who they bring in or what they spend. But we can control what we do and I’m pretty happy.
‘have the club done enough business to counter accusations of downsizing? Yes, I think we are healthy. We have spent some money and brought some quality players in very shrewdly.
‘We’ve also made a really good sale of a top player in Kieran tierney and we got top dollar (£25m) for him. It’s been a very good window.’
When the window closed on Monday night, Celtic had added elyounoussi, Christopher Jullien, Luca Connell, Boli Bolingoli, hatem Abd elhamed, Fraser Forster, Moritz Bauer and Greg taylor.
the Scottish champions also added teenage right-back Jeremie Frimpong from Manchester City and Manchester United defender Lee O’Connor on deadline day.
Lennon views Frimpong as ready to join the first-team squad immediately and he will run the rule over O’Connor.
‘I think we are strong. When you look at the defenders we lost in the summer — Mikael Lustig, Dedryck Boyata, Filip Benkovic and tierney — it was important to replace them. We’ve done that and I’m pleased with the business we’ve done.
‘Greg has been one of the best and most consistent players in the league for the past two or three seasons. So much so he’s now an international player and he’s played 112 or 113 games at club level.
‘he’s got a calmness and he’s a steadying influence. I never see him get isolated. he’s rarely in trouble. he’s comfortable on the ball, reads the game well and he knows the position.
‘We get criticised for not bringing Scottish boys through or for not relying on Scottish boys. But Greg’s a very good Scottish player who has age on his side. In another couple of years, he will really start to blossom. ‘Greg will complement Boli in that left-back position very well. ‘Boli played very well a t Ibrox and I was happy with his performance. A slow-burner, maybe we are starting to see the best of him now. ‘It’s good to have competition for places and it’s the same with Moritz and hatem — who I also thought was outstanding.’ Lennon also revealed that captain Scott Brown was behind the unusual tactic that saw Odsonne edouard lash the ball into the furthest corner of the pitch at kick-off in Govan. Celtic’s pressing at the subsequent throw-in set the tone for the game, which the visitors won courtesy of goals from edouard and hayes. ‘It surprised me a little bit when I saw it,’ said Lennon. ‘But I was delighted that’s the way they wanted to go. they could have gone back and then forward but they decided: “Right, bang! Let’s go!” ‘We had talked about it previously but I’m assuming it was Brownie who said: “Let’s do this!” It came from the players but, before we went out, we did re-emphasise that the last time we were at Ibrox we didn’t get out of our own half and were a goal down after two minutes.
‘We are a front-foot team so we wanted to play on the front foot. the players executed that perfectly.
‘We scored two great goals. I hear people saying they were gifted goals but we worked hard to get them. the second goal was a thing of beauty, really — a great counterattack with one-touch play.
‘We deserved to get the second goal because we missed two or three really good chances before it.
‘everything was against us, so we knew we had to be really strong on Sunday and not get spooked by anything.
‘We always knew that we would have bad moments in the game — or a period of being under pressure — but we handled it all very, very comfortably. It’s never comfortable but they made it look comfortable.’