Celtic chief sorry for ‘regrettable’ Dubai trip
Chief executive Peter Lawwell has admitted C el tic' s controversial decision to go to Dubai was "a mistake" and has apologised to the Parkhead club’s fans.
Celtic had confirmed defender Christopher Jullien tested positive for coronavirus but all other players and staff members were negative after being checked following their return to Scotland from a training camp last Friday.
However, 13 other players, manager Neil Lennon and assistant John Kennedy were deemed to be close contacts of Jullien and had to join the French centre-half in selfisolation.
First Minister Ni cola Sturgeon questioned whether the Dubai trip was essenti al and revealed doubts "based on some pictures I've seen whether adherence to bubble rules was strict enough".
Celtic fans themselves were leading the widespread criticism and amid afurore, it was a make shift side which drew 1-1 with Hi b ernian at Parkhead on Monday night.
Speaking in an in-house interview on the club' s official website Law well addressed the issue and said: "It has been an extremely difficult few days and on reflection, looking back and with hindsight and looking at the outcome of the trip, clearly it was a mistake and for that I profoundly apologise to our supporters.
"We left here and the rationale for the camp was very much with thebes tin tentions.
"Things haven' t gone the way we wanted to and the outcome is clearly very regrettable."
The draw against Hibs did little to lift the mood of the Celtic fans as it left them 21 points behind Rangers at the top of the Scottish Premi er ship with three games in hand and with their bid for 10 in a row in some jeopardy.
Law well expanded on the thinking behind the mid-season break abroad.
He said :" If you look back over the last four years, going to the camp in Dubai has been extremely successful.
"And the decisions we made in entirely for the best interests of the team and the best interests of the club.
"What we planned to do was take them again to these facilities, which are worldclass, after a very hectic program me in November and December which has in the past proven to be a great benefit in terms of performance after January, to get to that performance level again.
"In terms of the factss urrounding the trip, we decided in November togo and were permitted to go.
"Clearly the landscape has changed significantly, parti cu larlyint he run up of going to Dubai, particularly the infection rate and whatever. But at the time, Dubai was still part of the green
In the gloom enveloping Celtic once more, there has been one shining light. Midfielder David Turnbull continues to be no less than a beacon in the blackness. And for John Collins, there are reasons to believe that, however much the team have crumbled in their failed pursuit of a record 10th title, in the 21-year-old signed from Motherwell for £3.5m in the summer his old club have a gem they can rebuild around.
The stats that can be attached to Turnbull since he was given a starting run in the side as of mid-december make for stunning reading.
His glorious free-kick opener against Hibs on Monday night that gave way to Celtic conceding an added time equaliser was his fifth goal in only eight outings. Across those games, he has also fashioned three assists.
His output is all the more impressive when it is considered that Celtic had won only two of the previous 12 games when Neil Lennon turned to the Carluke-born performer for the final game of a dismal Europa League campaign.
The playmaker then introduced after he had been sidelined for the best part of a month with Covid-19.
He responded with a goal and an assist in a 3-2 victory over a Lille team that Francophile Collins rates a top drawer side. Yet, it is Turnbull’s temperament that the 52-year-old feels is as laudable as his talent.
“He plays with such self-belief that all good players must possess,” said Collins.
“He simply has all the tools: vision, a hunger to get on the ball at all times and make things happen and the technical ability to produce strikes and dead-ball expertise to deliver on that determination.
“It is easy to show all these attributes when you come into a winning side, but he was brought into a struggling team and still showed all those qualities. Look at the goals he has scored.
“He doesn’t chip in with the fourth or fifth in an easy win, he has been scoring goals that alter the entire complexion of games. He demands to be given that responsibility.
“Against Hibs the other night, he was the one that stepped up and produced a great free-kick when his team were crying out for a bit of quality and a goal.”
There are parallels to be drawn between Turnbull’s early days as a regular at Celtic and what Collins encountered when becoming the club’s first million-pound player in the summer of 1990.
Both were pitched in at the club enduring crisis times, though Collins points out that Rangers were then unstoppable in having money to burn and boasting “about half the England team in what will be regarded as about the best side in their history”.
“In the summer when Tunrbull joined no-one could have believed Rangers would be 21 points ahead in January, but Celtic have just been far too inconsistent and Rangers so very consistent,” he said.
There are other key differences too. Collins was an established international who had played almost 200 games at Hibs before his Celtic move aged 22.
Turnbull, meanwhile, had only 40 Motherwell appearances to his name because of the knee problem that led to a Celtic move being aborted in the summer of 2019, and which cost him almost the entire next season.
“How he has come back from that injury is another endorsement of what he is all about,” the former Celtic assistant said.
“Clearly, he is mentally very strong. He obviously did his rehab well and has come back even better.
“That is a great tribute to him, but I would never have said it was an issue that he had only made 40 senior appearances before his transfer.
“I say that because look what he did in them for Motherwell with his numbers for goals and assists [16 goals and nine assists produced in those games].”
Turnbull’s prowess can be summed up for Collins in what he calls ‘first touch direction’ excellence. “By that I mean the way he takes the ball in,” he said.
“If you watch, he does that and moves off in the direction that will give him the greatest amount of space and time in any situation. It is top notch, and tells you everything about his game awareness.
“He knows where to take the ball, and has the ability to do that. The fact he is so two-footed, which is alltoo-rare, is an outstanding element of that.”
It really should not be that Celtic are depending on a 21-year-old newbie to drag them through
games. Yet, Turnbull has all-of-a-sudden become their most influential performer. Collins cautions against expecting him consistently to live up to such a billing when his career at the club remains in his infancy.
“It is still very early days for him at Celtic and you don’t want to put too much pressure on him, in terms of what it is reasonable to expect,” he said. “He has made himself a first pick and is affecting games on a regular basis.
“That is good going. More than that, he has surely given Celtic supporters enjoyment in a season where there hasn’t been nearly as much of that as they would like.
“They must enjoy watching him play because you couldn’t not with how he has attacked his performances.
“He is the type that does look as if he was born to play for Celtic, and long may that continue.”