LAWWELL MUST FLEX FINANCIAL MUSCLE WISELY
Stephen Halliday: Chief executive needs to review Celtic’s recruitment model after Champions League exit
In any other sphere of business, Peter Lawwell would be the subject of unequivocal praise for his performance as a chief executive over the past 16 years.
Presiding over a profitable company which is the established leader in its own domestic market and boasting almost £38 million cash at the bank in its most recent accounts, Lawwell should have shareholders queuing up to express their gratitude for his shrewd competency.
Instead, the 60-year-old found himself in the firing line this week as Celtic supporters vented their fury at the club’s painful elimination from the Champions League.
The accusations that Lawwell is more interested in the balance sheet than the teamsheet at Celtic Park are as familiar as they are arbitrary. It’s a default position for some fans – many of them shareholders too – whenever Celtic suffer a significant setback on the pitch.
Lawwell can be expected to face the criticism in the same imperturbable manner he always has since his appointment by the club back in 2003. Being thick-skinned is as important as being clearheaded for the man who has seen Celtic win 26 major domestic honours during his period at the helm.
But as much as Lawwell will comfortably ride this latest storm of angst among those who follow the Scottish champions, he must also be fully aware of his responsibility in addressing the issues which were laid bare by the dramatic 4-3 defeat by Cluj which left Celtic Park in a state of shock on Tuesday night.
If not in disarray, the recruitment model of the club is certainly showing signs of wear and tear. The buy ’em cheap, sell ’em high strategy has reaped rich dividends for Celtic with the stream of eightfigure
transfers of Victor Wanyama, Fraser Forster, Virgil van Dijk, Moussa Dembele and, most recently, Kieran Tierney.
But the sourcing of replacement talent has proved more problematic over the past couple of years. No club gets everything right when it comes to signing players but there have been too few hits and far too many misses for Celtic in the last few transfer windows.
The next couple of weeks, before the latest transfer deadline on 2 September, will be scrutinised ever more closely by the Celtic fans as they assess the readiness of Neil Lennon’s team in the quest for a record-equalling ninth consecutive league title.
Lennon contends, not unreasonably, that the personnel at his disposal were not the reason Celtic lost to Cluj. The manager is in no doubt the players he picked were good enough to prevail and should have seen the job through in a tie in which they engineered a winning position more than once throughout the two legs.
As he must, Lennon intends to leave Tuesday night firmly in the past as he approaches a pivotal spell which encompasses the Europa League play-off against AIK Stockholm and the first Old Firm game of the season at Ibrox against a buoyant Rangers side whose supporters are growing in belief that this will be the season when they wrench the title away from Celtic.
That’s a scenario in which not even Lawwell would find it easy to maintain his equilibrium among the frenzied reaction it would provoke within the Celtic fanbase.
Despite their Champions League disappointment, Celtic remain in a position of strength in Scottish football. If they flex their financial muscles wisely enough over the next fortnight, they should be able to hold off a challenge from Rangers, who look to have recruited smartly themselves under the increasingly assured management of Steven Gerrard this summer.
Anything less, and the next Celtic agm will be a stormy affair, regardless of how well the share price is holding up.
No club gets everything right when signing players but there have been too few hits and far too many misses for Celtic in the last few windows