Deila wants to move on and ‘get league over the line’

RONNY Deila insisted his focus was on trying to win the Ladbrokes Premiership rather than growing speculation over his future after his Celtic side bowed out of the William Hill Scottish Cup at the semi-final stage for a second successive season.

Deila can still partially rescue an otherwise dismal campaign by securing his club’s fifth successive league championship, but he accepts questions over his future are now unavoidable and insists he does not expect pity.

“Overall, it’s my responsibility and, if it’s not good enough on the pitch, then it’s not good enough,” he said.

“You know you are going to get those questions all the time. I am very disappointed, but I’m not thinking about that at all. I know why the question is coming, but we have to just lift ourselves after this disappointment and get the league over the line.

“Will I survive? That’s for the future. After this match, it’s hard to talk about things. There is a lot of emotion. We can’t expect pity and I can’t either.”

The strength of Rangers’ performance suggests the gap between the two clubs is not as wide as had been previously thought ahead of the Ibrox club’s return to the top division next season.

“We will be ready when they come up,” said Deila. “We’ll see next year what they have to offer. It’s a totally different thing to do it over 38 games than doing it over one. They have improved and have the second biggest budget in the country and they will have pressure to perform.”

Deila revealed, however, that he was unhappy with his team. “I’m not very satisfied with the performance,” he said. “In the first half, we didn’t press well enough and we were not intensive enough in that we could have intercepted more balls. We need to be much quicker and calmer on the ball. The positive is that we came back two times and created some chances, but, overall, it’s not the best day we’ve had.”

Deila did not make too much of the fact the decision to award a throw-in to Rangers ahead of their second goal should have been given the other way.

“It’s a clear throw-in to Celtic, but if that is the main part of the game, it’s too small a detail,” he added. “We should have stopped it.”