Lustig feels Celtic showed lack of respect
FORMER Celtic hero Mikael Lustig has insisted the club showed him a lack of respect in their efforts to keep him this summer.
And he’s revealed he had words with former manager Brendan Rodgers about his decision to leave the Scottish champions to move to Leicester City.
The 32-year-old won an incredible 16 trophies at Parkhead in a eightyear spell with the Parkhead side.
But the Swedish international opted to leave this summer to forge a new career at ambitious Belgian side Gent.
And Lustig admitted for the first time he wasn’t happy with the terms offered by Celtic, with only a oneyear deal reportedly on the table, compared to the three years he got at Gent.
Lustig said: “Celtic will always have a huge place in my heart, but in football, we are not always alone in deciding.
“They offered to keep me on and, come on, I respect the club too much to say bad things about it.
“But I gave everything to them for eight years... I was expecting a little more respect in return.
“My family and my ex-team-mates know what happened, that’s the most important thing.
“And I do not want to close this door, I want to feel good when I return to Glasgow.”
And while Lustig relished every one of his eight league titles, he admitted it got more difficult each year... especially after the deparure of former manager Rodgers.
He said: “At Celtic, we knew at the start of every season we had a good chance of being champion, but to do it for eight years in a row wasn’t easy. Every year it was more difficult.
“I truly hope Celtic will reach the 10-in-a-row with all my heart.
“Intermsofmanagers,NeilLennon persuaded me to move to Celtic so he is the most important coach for me. Tactically, the best was Brendan Rodgers... a true perfectionist.
“I only regret that he left the way he did. When you say you are a fan of Celtic you do not quit the club in February. I do not approve of his choice and he knows it.” NEIL LENNON has criticised UEFA for favouring Europe’s biggest leagues when it comes to Champions League participation, a process which he believes is damaging football.
Successful qualification for Celtic into the group stages of the prestigious tournament involves eight games, a marathon process that begins long before squads are settled and competitive football has begun.
“I think it’s damaging the game the way it’s now set up,” said the Celtic manager. “It’s unfair. Even three or four years ago, I was at the Uefa convention and teams like Shakhtar Donetsk were making a case that they weren’t getting a fair enough crack of the whip either.
“It’s the Champions League and we are the champions of Scotland and have been consistently. I’m watching a fixture the other day – PSV against Basel. That would grace any Champions League group.
“It’s incredible really. And it’s only going to get tougher. We are aware of the importance but also the difficulty of these things. If we qualified, and it’s still a big if, that’s eight games. That’s a quarter of a season before a ball is really kicked in anger in your domestic campaign.”
For the second successive season four out of the big five leagues in Europe have four automatic qualification places directly into the group stages, despite the fact there can be a significant gap between the champions of the respective leagues and those who finish below.
Valencia finished 26 points behind Barcelona, while this season’s Champions League finalists Spurs finished 27 points adrift of Premier League winners Manchester City. It was a similar story in Germany – Bayern Leverkusen were 20 points behind winners Bayern Munich and in Italy Inter Milan were 21 points shy of Seria A champions Juventus.
By contrast, the champions of Scotland, Sweden, Serbia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia all face lengthy journeys to secure a Champions League invitation.
Former Romanian international Dan Petrescu, manager of FC Cluj whom Celtic are set to play in the third qualifying round if the Romanians prevail against Maccabi Tel Aviv, has also lamented the way the process has been stacked in favour of the bigger clubs this week.
“We fight like a lunatic one year, we become champions and then wake up every two days on planes,” said Petrescu, who made his firstteam debut the month after Steaua Bucharest became European champions in 1986.
His complaints did not go unnoticed by Lennon, who was quick to concur.
“I see Dan Petrescu having a bit of a complaint about that and he’s right,” the Celtic manager said. “When you are champions of your country you shouldn’t have to play four qualifiers to make the group stage.
“However, that’s where we are. We’re nearly halfway there although there could be another difficult tie ahead of us.
“Spurs’ argument would be that they made the Champions League final but there’s a to and a fro for that. It’s such a difficult thing to do. It’s really difficult to balance it as well with the squad and the league games as well.
“If you finish fourth in one country, you qualify. I think that’s unfair. I really do. No matter how difficult people may say the Premier League is.
“Winning the championship in any