MAKE CELTIC A EURO FORCE
Rodgers is galvanised by the prospect of building a team who’ll become serious players on the Continental stage
THE initial headlines were all about being around for ten-in-a-row. Considering the new four-year contract agreed by Brendan Rodgers and Celtic will expire at the same time that historic achievement could be completed, it seemed a natural road to go down. However, there are other reasons why the 44-year-old Northern Irishman put pen to paper on Friday. It protects the club and guarantees greater compensation should an offer from elsewhere emerge that no one can possibly refuse.
However, there is a very particular challenge at Celtic which fires Rodgers’ imagination.
Making history as the manager who won a tenth consecutive title would be wonderful, but his eyes are fixed on Europe and using everything he has gathered in his coaching armoury over the past two decades to defy finances and make the Scottish champions a team capable of achieving great things.
Until a credible domestic challenge emerges, Rodgers is likely to be judged on what happens in Europe. One painful night in the Nou Camp aside — the 7-0 defeat to Barcelona — he had an encouraging start this term, drawing twice with Manchester City in the Champions League and coming agonisingly close to snatching an impressive victory at Borussia Monchengladbach.
He will continue to face teams with far more wealth at their disposal, more internationally-recognised players, more strength in depth. He has to believe there is a way round those hurdles, though. That bringing players through the academy system and marrying them with talent picked up at the right price at the right time — rather like Moussa Dembele and Scott Sinclair — can create its own dynamic.
Rodgers has been in the millionaires’ playground of the Premier League. He came close to winning it with Liverpool. He was at the centre of a large-scale spending spree at Anfield and admits it caused him to lose sight somewhat of the things he knows he’s good at, working on the training field, developing talent and teamwork.
From that viewpoint, the task of building Celtic into a team capable of competing in Europe is as interesting and exacting a mission as he could wish for. It is why, when others may wonder what there is to satisfy him in Scotland, he plans to hang around for some time yet.
‘As a coach, I couldn’t ask for a bigger challenge, to make Celtic a force in Europe without the finances available at other clubs,’ he said. ‘That’s why I signed for four years. I did not think there was (a bigger challenge). If I went back to the Premier League, I’d go into millions of pounds, where it’s all about buying.
‘What is forgotten about is nurturing players. We’re a blue-chip club who will always want top players, but we also have to bring young ones through and that’s the challenge I’m really looking forward to.
‘Can we continue with this run while growing and developing a team to take us to that stage? Listen, the game’s about quality players. If you have them, you go further. If you don’t, you must find a way of maximising what you have. In this climate, that’s what we’ll have to do.
‘The transfer record for this club is the same as it was 10 years ago, but I want to develop young players and also bring in experienced ones who can be a good influence.
‘And I have to find a way of playing that’s synonymous with Celtic. Just as I had at Swansea.
‘We didn’t have the best individuals there. But we had a collective that was really strong. It allowed us to beat the best teams. That’s what we have to do here when we’re on that stage.’
Rodgers has the free rein to work at Celtic that he would be unlikely to receive in England. He has spoken about his initial meetings with major shareholder Dermot Desmond and chief executive Peter Lawwell when he was invited to become the ‘architect of the club’.
This is his baby, his project and it has to be exciting.
‘I’ve been given total trust and that can’t be underestimated,’ he said. ‘All the experience I have had from being a youth coach to a manager, I’ll now be able to impose.
‘Liverpool was an incredible club, but complicated. I struggled in that environment. I need a level of control to allow me to function. ‘The target for Celtic will always be qualifying for the group stage of the Champions League. Then, if you can get to the last 16, it would be a huge achievement in the current financial market. ‘If you don’t get out (of the group stage), can you finish in a Europa League position? Then can you go as far as you possibly can. It’s a difficult prospect.
‘Liverpool played 18 games or so to get to the Europa League final and lost, but it’s about being in there consistently and showing up well.
‘Next season, the plan is qualifying for the group stage again. Getting beyond the Christmas period in Europe would be another step for us.
It’s about being in there consistently and showing up well
But each year is getting harder because of the calibre of the teams financially. ‘We played Borussia Monchengladbach this season and we were deemed the two group minnows. But their budget is £110million — and they are dwarfed by both Barcelona and Manchester City. Then you have us at between £17 and £20million.’ There will be always be those down south, in particular, who will wonder why Rodgers is committing himself to what is currently a one-horse race of a championship. It is something that rests easily with him.
‘When we won the league last week at Hearts, I had more messages than I’ve ever had in my life,’ said Rodgers. ‘And those were mainly from people in England.
‘You never truly know the scale of Celtic. The two boys (Chris Davies and Glen Driscoll) who joined me had been around the game for a while.
‘There was more financial gain going elsewhere, but I told them it would be great for us. You speak to them now, nine months on, and they have sighs of happiness every day at Lennoxtown.
‘You can’t buy that. Life is about timing and it just felt right to come here.’