In a moment of irony so perfect you couldn’t have scripted it, Ronny Deila was awarded with the SPL Manager of the Month accolade for January today, just 48 hours after we crashed out of the League Cup, and on the very day an Irish newspaper suggests his time at Parkhead is nearing the end.
Deila deserved the award.
There’s no doubt about that at all.
Our form over January was pretty damned good, and had led to a lot of people speculating that perhaps we’d turned a corner, only for all the old weakness to resurface at the weekend and at the worst possible time.
I said after the 8-0 win over Hamilton that I was sitting firmly on the fence, refusing to view it as more than just a freakishly good result … but it was hard not to feel a pang of optimism at the way we so casually overwhelmed them.
This is typical of the schizophrenic way things are going at Celtic at the moment; it’s like Good Day, Bad Day, Good Day, Bad Day.
We take a step forward and then a step back.
The award will come as no consolation to the Celtic boss, or to the fans who had to watch that miserable performance at the weekend, and it will not help the board if they’ve yet to come to a final decision about what to do with the Norwegian, who everyone agrees is a Bloody Nice Guy, but many now suspect doesn’t have the temperament or skills to be manager at our club.
Congratulations to him for it anyway, and if he picks up the accolade again next month I would be pretty pleased with that, as it means tomorrow night’s match must have gone well.
That one scares the Hell out of me right now.
Of course, if rumours are to be believed the decision on his future has already been taken and Michael O’Neill, the former Shamrock Rovers and Brechin boss, and now manager of Northern Ireland, has already been quietly sounded out about the post.
Some will ask why, if that’s true, Ronny hasn’t already been dispatched. I asked that question myself in the earlier piece.
The answer might be a simple one.
Perhaps people at Celtic feel they owe him more than a shove out the door.
Perhaps they think a guy like Ronny is entitled to see out the season and try and depart on good terms with the fans, and with his CV intact.
I can fully understand that sentiment.
No-one likes to see a Celtic boss under pressure, except maybe the media, who plainly love it and have never placed an Ibrox incumbent under the same, and especially not when he’s such a genial fellow and one you instinctively want to do well.
I’ll tell you something, if the O’Neill rumour is true I hope to God we’ve already told Ronny that he’s going, because something would stink if we were making moves behind his back.
I’m pleased he has won this award.
I hope he wins a couple more of them as we head towards the end of the season.
I also hope he leaves us when it’s done, for his sake as much as ours.
Because he deserves better than all this, because he is a good bloke and although out of his depth here I can’t, and won’t, hold that against him as a man.
I hope you are wrong James, I sincerely believe Deila is a fine manager who has not received full support from the board.
Are you serious Stevie???
21 signings…£15million and he still has no plan B.
This manager has been backed by the board at a time when money is not a plenty.
I blame the board for one thing…this guy should have been shown the door some time ago.
And if I had my way would have been asked to leave right after the Malmo game in the CL qualifiers. This team will not progress to the CL next season. If I am wrong I will gladly take it on the chin for that statement.
I am watching a team who if they go behind wont come back. You could count on one hand how many times we have turned games around.
A lot of Celtic fans stated recently “If Deila does not win the Treble he should go”…well guess what the treble has went and we have to suffer another 5 months of his strange team selections, his favourites getting selected and his strange substitutions. It is no coincidence that again we witnessed Celtic fans booing as he took off Biton on Sunday.
I have said before…20 years a season ticket holder and seriously will consider not returning next season if this guy is still manager.
Progress!!!! what progress.
Stay off the wine…Stevie
If any Celtic supporter believes that Michaeil O’Neill will be a step forward from Ronny Deila then they must be mental. We keep hearing Ronny out but who will replace him. It’s easy to say ‘anyone will do better’ but they won’t. No tried and tested manager will touch a job in Scotland. It is the untried and unemployed that will be available and then back to the start. But they might be ‘real Celik men’. Good grief.
I don’t think we have the luxury of waiting till the end of season as we will hopefully be forming a team fit for CL by the end of July. Ronnie must turn it around very quickly, starting tomorrow, if he is to be given responsibility for taking us further in Europe. I just wonder if he could have done better with his own choice of assistant but maybe too late for that
Well said John. Be careful what you wish for guys, Michael O’Neill is NOT the answer
HH
Crazy for any Celtic minded person to undermine RD. Look at the squad we are building. Fantastic potential there. We are creating a CL team. KTF.
Good shout m8
Davie Moyes has already confirmed in an interview with Peter Martin last year, he would like to become Celtic manager.
I think Deila has been a footbal disaster. He said the team lackof spirit and usually doesn’t fight back. He’s right. But I remember Lennon’s team (3-0 against Shaktar): the players were not too much better than the corrent ones, but were ready to fight because their manager was the first warrior. Deila is a benchwarmer and nothing more. To this you should add his tactics and his love for Johansen (who this season is simply too bad to play). The fact Commons is still the best plaer we have tells a lot. Ronny Deila can be a good coach for the reserve team, but he is not up to the job (at least, not yet). I would like to see Stubbs as Celtic manager. Look at Hibs this season and imagine it with a different budget and less useless player from abroad (Boyata, Cifcti, Janko, Ambrose)….
Michael O’Neill, are you kidding me he’s won what 2 league of Ireland titles and a Setanta cup sounds like we wont pay for a real manager let me see what about Owen Coyle ,David Moyes, Brendan Rodgers, Gary Monk to name but a few with the experience to be the next manager get real if we want to be a force again we need to get a real manager not a wanna be.
He’s qualified for a major international tournament winning the group with the 5th seeds. Admittedly it was a weak group but that’s a fantastic achievement.
He won he Irish league for the first time in 18 years with Shamrock Rovers and then retained the title. He also had creditable Euro campaigns taking Rovers to the 3rd qualifier of the CL getting beaten by Juventus & Copenhagen and also took Rovers to the Europa group stages beating Partizan Belgrade to get there. All in all I think it’s a decent CV. We could do worse.
Doing the rounds here in N.Ireland its gonna be Brendan Rodgers
James James James. Stop it. You me and no one else knows if anyone has been ‘sounded out’ Red top shite that you normally don’t indulge in. Ups and downs with Celtic as it has always been and always will. We’ll hopefully be out of site after tomorrow and maybe we’ll do the double! HH.
With total respect, utter nonsense John.
Deila was a terrible choice f om the start, and has done nothing to change knowledgable people’s mind since. Never in my 64 years have we witnessed such a disaster of a manager. This incompetent makes John Barnes and Liam Brady look good.
pish – he’s not even the worst Celtic manager in the last 5 we’ve had
James
I sincerely hope that the board are making (behind his back) moves and considering who they will replace him with, one more bad defeat to a lower team and i say lower very loosely and he will be gone,he may not be sacked because of the ( Mr nice guy) but may hopefully resign…..
Your blog the other day was all about no plan B……and that was right, surely our board will have a plan B if we fall again to a team that we should… in normal circumstances beat.
He will not be sacked if Aberdeen do get a result on Wednesday but we cant have fear although like you that match is a concern at the moment……that team on Sunday as already said had no fight, no grit, etc etc etc…….and i do think that Ronny tried to shift a lot of the blame to the players “we were weak” and away from himself with that comment BUT he picked the team and the tactics and the substitutions and HIS decisions were the things that finally cost us and this has happened too often in his tenure.
The Northern Ireland manager? why not? Moyes…..why not if we can afford him? you could pull out more names who would be tactically more aware than our current set up, when the respect of the fans start to go then the change will surely come…..after another bad loss OR at the end of the season………and he can take a few of our players with him,no need to mention names we all know who they are.
HH
You are falling into the media trap of telling us who our next manager will be. They work the same way as Unionists, they divide in order to conquer. That is what they are trying to do with us. Celtic fans can be very fickle.
Incidentally, I do believe that Hamilton scored and that it was 8-1 to us. It may be pedantic to point this out, but it is correct. I’m getting fed up with negativism. We did not beat Ross County. So what! It means there will be a refreshing new winner’s name on the League Cup Trophy. It is amazing how many other clubs get a crack at the whip when Scotland’s shame are not able to cheat their way to anything. Let’s get behind Celtic, stop moaning at home games and let them hear our support.
HH M8
You people are deluded if you think we could get Moyes or Rogers. They could take their pick of any mid-table Premier league team and earn 5 times as much with 10 times the budget. And Pablo above says Garry Monk has experience? News to me. 18 months as a manager, left Swansea in relegation trouble. Then he says Owen Coyle who got sacked by Wigan and Bolton, and who has such a great rep that he now manages Houston Dynamo in the US.
Get real Bhoys. We’ve not got the budget to get someone big enough to manage in England. We’re always going to get either a rookie or someone tainted.
What a joke of an article. Ronny was unfortunate on Sunday the first 10 mins we cud have been 3 up if Griff had turned up. The efe who has been great in the last couple of matches made an error but it wasn’t totally his fault. Down to 10 men it was going to be difficult but their 2nd goal should not have stood it was a foul bad ref decision again. Even Griff can’t score a penalty that wasn’t a penalty that is how bad he was. So all in all it wasn’t to be our day. We have been good recently so calling for Ronny’s head is out of order & I sure don’t want Michael O’Neil.
why are all these alleged celtic supporters (when things are rosy)always buying into the media frenzy of sack ronny?i understand not everyone is happy giving the loss to ross co,rewind 2 mins,efe did little wrong,be honest ,if that was scott brown,celtic started the game unbelievably well.then inexplicably the ref changes the game,AGAIN,but lets sack the manager ,its his fa fault
Anyone on here who thinks Delia is doing a good job and is a good manager, you’re going to be taken away by people in white coats..and for us Celtic fans who clearly care more about the club and want him replaced, no point in speculating guys, it’s the board’s job to find a good replacement, that’s what they get paid a fortune for….
Unfortunately the problems at Celtic right now lie a lot deeper than just the management team, although I do think they must be replaced but I won’tcall for them to be fired. The club needs a whole revamp in the way we recruit and develop players. The moneyball project has produced (by my reckoning) 6-8 sucesses. Whereas the failure rate is astounding, particularly in the strikers position. Two men, P Lawell and J Park seem to have the final say on all signing and outgoing tranfers and I would say their strategy is erratic at best. Sending our own youngsters (Fisher, Henderson, etc) out on loan while we develop EPL teams’ youths to me is ridiculous. We have a starting 11 of players in the midfield position alone but only 1 striker we trust to play. Las year we had 3-4 players we trusted to play the rb now we have a broken down Lustig and Efe (bombscare) Ambose as cover). I could go on but I would need. my own blog. In my opinion we need a new manager with a strong personality with a clear recruitment strategy for HIS team Not John Park’s vision
Deila lasts to nd of season we will get attendance of under 10k, board must see that, ST renewals could be disastrous, HH
Gary monk and Brendan Rodgers can get to fuck
If the “unfortunate big-game slip-ups” in important games had occurred once, twice or even three times in RD’s overall Celtic record, they could certainly be excused as possibly due to bad luck, poor refereeing, injuries to key players etc. But these “unfortunate big-game slip-ups” seem to now becoming the norm rather than the exception.
RD’s clearly had more than enough time to demonstrate his managerial abilities. He may be fine for a lesser team like Stromgodset but he obviously doesn’t make the grade at Celtic. Like any player who doesn’t perform up to expectations, he should be shipped out.
It would be david moyes for me ronnie delia hasnt a clue defo not michael oneill