Admirers won’t be won in derby... Rodgers needs to shine in Europe
IT’S 18 years since a lengthy pursuit of the England manager finally prompted Kevin Keegan to answer his phone. Picking Celtic defender Alan Stubbs wasn’t high on his immediate list of priorities, but give Keegan this: He played ball. With a caveat.
‘Before picking him, I would tend to wait and see how he plays against Rangers because, with no disrespect to the rest of the teams in the league or without being unkind, that’s the best gauge.’
In 1999, Dick Advocaat had the pick of Dutch and German internationals at Ibrox. Martin O’Neill was about to leave Leicester City to paper over the cracks left by John Barnes and Kenny Dalglish at Celtic. Scotland’s national team had qualified for a World Cup just 12 months earlier.
And still the England call for Stubbs never came.
When Craig Bellamy says people down south are unimpressed by the achievements of Brendan Rodgers at Celtic, then, he might have a point
Two decades ago, managers and chairmen in England were well down the road to regarding Scottish football with outright contempt. Their journey is now complete.
A Celtic loan signing for all of five minutes 12 years ago, what Bellamy (below) knows about the current state of Scottish football could be written in block caps on the back of a first-class stamp.
To claim Rodgers might struggle to get another job in England sounds like another cheap shot at the game up here.
But the former Newcastle and Liverpool striker is only reflecting a common view of the Premiership amongst Little Englanders.
Brian from Bristol or Colin from Corby might speak from a position of almost total ignorance. But they’re not alone in thinking our top flight is a ‘pub league’. A one-horse race.
Down south, Celtic’s dominance of the Scottish game is seen as the football equivalent of knocking down skittles.
This week, the Parkhead club announced an annual turnover of £90million, with a profit of £7m. They’ve won the last six titles, won a domestic Treble last season and haven’t lost in 56 domestic games.
Ronny Deila won the title two seasons running — and finished up back in Norway managing relegation-threatened Valerenga.
It’s hardly pushing it, then, to suggest events at Ibrox this lunchtime will have little impact on the consciousness of English chairmen. The Kevin Keegan test might have applied in 1999. It doesn’t now.
The days when a Celtic player or manager would be judged on how many Scottish titles he won are gone.
It’s no longer enough to rack up a few wins against a battle-scarred, asset-stripped Rangers. Judgments are now based on what Rodgers does in Europe.
The killing fields of the Champions League dictate when — or if — the phone rings and whether it shows a London or Manchester dial code. Or, based on recent evidence, Southampton and Swansea. A manager with an intelligent footballing brain, a domestic clean sweep on his CV and a Liverpool win ratio higher than current incumbent Jurgen Klopp after the same number of games, the stock of Rodgers is high. He’s in no rush to leave Celtic but, in life, there’s one inevitability. No managerial reign lasts forever. And how Celtic fare against Anderlecht in Brussels on Wednesday night will be a bigger factor in his next destination than today’s result against Rangers. To chairmen in the English Premier League, a manager who wins games in Europe’s richest competition trumps the coach with a raft of wins at Ibrox hands down.
‘The challenge in Scotland just isn’t there anymore,’ said Bellamy. ‘And it could take Rangers another three or so years to get back up there with them again.’
The Ibrox side will make it their business to prove him wrong today. Even without Bruno Alves.
But when Rodgers decides to return to English football, the Champions League will be his calling card. Beating Rangers 5-1 won’t rate a mention.
Losing seven goals to Barcelona and five to Paris Saint-Germain suggests a degree of tactical tweaking is required.
But if he knocks Anderlecht into fourth place in Group B and secures a run to the latter stages of the Europa League, the Celtic boss might do something some of the biggest names in British management never quite mastered. Shut Craig Bellamy up.