Who Are The Clubs Eddie Howe Might Realitically Pick Over Celtic?

As we move into cup week, more Bet365 betting opportunities, and the inevitable avalanche of media headlines and attempts to unsettle us before it, I think it’s probably worth looking at the coverage of the Eddie Howe situation since a clickbait site said, last week, that he was talking to Palace.

First up, do we believe it? The truth is that I don’t.

Not because there isn’t something plausible about the story – the idea that Howe’s team is talking off the record to some interested parties is not in the least hard to swallow – but because the website that ran it runs a dozen “exclusives” a week and all of them are rank rotten and often even ridiculous.

I don’t think they have a scrap of actual knowledge about what Howe is getting up to, and so any story out there which is based on theirs from last week should be filed under “highly dubious” and ignored.

If Howe is talking to Palace there will be mainstream sports desks writing about it soon enough; the press in Scotland might not know this stuff, but the English based media certainly will.

Let’s be honest, if Howe slips past us he’s not doing it for football reasons.

It’s about one of two things; it’s either about money or it’s about his not getting the type of control at Celtic that he wants. I wrote about this last night. If people on our board think that any top manager is going to come to the club without that sort of control they are quite mad.

We’ll end up with John Kennedy by default, as the only one who’ll want the gig.

If the issue is money there’s almost certainly nothing we can do about that, as the EPL can pay such ludicrous salaries that trying to match even a Palace would be utterly futile.

If he’s only in it for the money, then it’s better we find that out now rather than give ourselves a hostage to fortune later on by putting him in the job and having heart palpitations with every Sky Sports Breaking News bar for the next three years.

To me that won’t arise. He’ll either go for the money this time around or go to a club that can satisfy his footballing ambitions, which will be us. We know Howe will have EPL clubs interested in him, this is just a fact of life.

If he turns down a couple of them and signs up with us now, then we’re probably in good shape when others come calling.

It’s always possible that a job will come up later which is too good for him to turn down, but what kind of job would that be?

That’s what I want to take a look at.

A Relegation Battler. Examples: Fulham, West Brom, Sheffield Utd

Would Eddie Howe take a job at a club that was going to be facing relegation every season, or who were actually on the brink of going down or confirmed to go down?

The answer appears to be no, because, really, which ambitious manager with Celtic on offer would?

The thing with actually naming example teams is that in some cases you have to go with how the league table looks right now, but we know that Palace and other sides have flirted with the drop in recent years, and that newly promoted teams are especially vulnerable to it.

So whilst those are the clubs in the EPL drop zone right now you could include others in this number, and that will include whomever is promoted from the Championship.

Right now, Norwich, Watford, Brentford, Swansea, Barnsley and Bournemouth are all either looking good to go up or are in the play-off contention. Howe has been at one of those clubs already; are any of them a more attractive prospect than we are?

As I said here, we need to be thinking of a scenario where we hire Howe and EPL interest comes up … we suppose that he won’t just want to go anywhere.

I would stipulate that none of these clubs would hold his interest, no club in the relegation zone or likely to find themselves there.

The named clubs could easily be joined in that spot by three or four others, and I think we can rule them out just now and in the future.

A Premier League “Survivor”. Examples: Palace, Burnley, Brighton.

A step up from those plucky relegation scrappers, and furthermore, a step Howe has taken before.

These are the clubs who are outside of the relegation zone but have hit their glass ceiling and aren’t going anywhere else fast. These aren’t even mid-table teams.

Howe has been there, seen that and done it.

Why would he want such a dead end job again?

He already has “EPL Boss” on his CV so he doesn’t need to check that particular box.

What would the attraction be for him?

I am sure that keeping a club like Palace or Brighton or even Newcastle – as I said, these positions are very interchangeable – in the EPL is a challenge, and I am sure that for some managers they feel a sense of fulfilment at having done so … but mainly these are the jobs that come down to either bosses needing experience or managers chasing money.

There is no good “footballing” argument for someone Howe’s age winding up back there.

If Celtic loses Howe to one of these sides then it’s either good riddance to him or something has gone very, very badly wrong at Celtic Park.

A Mid Table Team. Examples: Villa, Leeds, Southampton, Newcastle.

Is there a realistic risk that Eddie Howe would reject Celtic, or leave Celtic at some future date, for a mid-table EPL team?

The answer to that is … possibly.

But I think it highly unlikely at the same time, because there can’t be anything worse than running a club that is comfortably mid-table and so has no fear of the drop, but can’t rise any higher either.

Again, there might be something good for many managers in trying to run a mid-table side who occasionally has a good cup run or challenges for a European spot, but honestly I couldn’t think of anything more mind-numbing.

When I spoke on the Endless Celts podcast the other day this is what I referred to as “existing” at a Premier League level, and some managers are undoubtedly content to do that, and have spent years bouncing from one such club to another.

They are certainly rich men, but their win ratio hovers just below 50% and they never win honours.

The papers seem to think that Newcastle is a possible for Howe, but that club is a managerial death sentence, and the chairman is not exactly renowned for being Mr Nice Guy. Even those of us who occasionally raise a laugh at his treatment of the glib and shameless one wouldn’t want to work for this guy for two seconds.

Again, I understand that the challenge here is to raise one of these teams above its status and to try and win a cup or do well enough to get to Europe and make a run of it there, but the chances of any of these clubs getting their hands on silverware is low … it seems to be “settling for” and maybe Howe is that kind of manager … but I hope not.

A European Qualifier. Examples: Everton, Wolves, West Ham, Leicester

Is there a chance that we could lose Eddie Howe to one of these clubs, either now or in the future?

Oh yes, that’s a very real risk and one that we should take seriously.

If there was a job available at any of the English clubs who, with the right management team, could realistically finish in a European spot, challenge for trophies and make a good fist of it in the Europa League then we’d have to be on our toes because these kinds of clubs have enough ambition to make it happen. But that’s not the end of the story, of course.

The reason why this would be a concern is that we’ve already lost a manager to one of these sides, and of course it was Leicester. But there are two things that make that case exceptional.

First is that Leicester were only two years off a title win, and Rodgers had just enough hubris to believe that he could repeat the trick with them. Secondly, and this might be the most important element, Rodgers believed that his time at Celtic was coming to an end when that job became available and was pig-sick of working with Peter Lawwell.

Had that relationship been better, had things been more settled, had Rodgers gotten his players that summer, would he have so quickly up sticks and left the minute one of these jobs became available?

I don’t know, but that’s the point of it.

Lawwell’s interference never gave us a chance … and we would have had a chance had that not been the case. Whilst the risk is real, so too is the possibility that Rodgers would have seen out his contract and been at Parkhead long enough to complete the ten.

A Champions League Team. Examples: Spurs, Arsenal.

If a club at this level or higher comes in for Eddie Howe or whoever we end up with then forget it, because he’s going to go and we would have to reconcile ourselves to that fact.

There are financial reasons why and there are footballing reasons why and the logic of it is plainly unarguable and we would be wasting our time to deny that.

There is a possibility that Arsenal will tire of Arteta before this season ends, and it’s possible that Spurs will tire of Mourinho, just as it’s possible that other clubs in the top brackets might decide to dispense with the services of their own management teams.

But let’s be frank; Arsenal fans are now realising the truth that was told to them when they demanded the sacking of Arsene Wegner.

His consistency in keeping them in the top four was astounding, and although they challenge for that spot they aren’t a guaranteed top four side any longer. Spurs are a side who should be considered a Champions League team but they underachieve.

Nevertheless, these are clubs who want candidates matching a certain profile; Arsenal’s moment to go for Howe would have been when he was the longest serving boss in the league.

Their fans might have accepted that, then, but they won’t now. They will insist on – they will demand – that the club go out and find a proven winner next time.

And Spurs are not going to go from Pochettino and Mourinho to a guy who’s not had a club in nearly a year, and if he’s at Celtic Park they aren’t going to pluck a manager from Scotland.

This is why I never took seriously any of the suggestions that Rodgers might be Arsenal bound or anywhere like that when he was at our club … I bet their fans regret not going for him, but their board didn’t think that a guy managing up here was up to their standards.

I don’t expect that either club would go for Eddie Howe until he’s done something major in the game.

What would that be at the moment?

What would it take at Celtic Park?

A Genuine Contender. Example: Chelsea, Manchester Utd.

Manchester Utd are managed, right now, by a favourite son.

Chelsea were and not that long ago.

Eddie Howe didn’t play for either and has no relationship with either.

It is unthinkable that he would have gotten either job and it’s unthinkable next time around.

Manchester United will go for a proven, top drawer, boss the next time there’s a vacancy there and Chelsea has learned a powerful lesson for the mistake they made in hiring Lampard.

These clubs will not go for Eddie Howe unless he gets Celtic to the semi-finals of the Champions League, knocking one of them out along the way.

If one of these clubs comes in for Howe at any point he’s gone, absolutely 100% gone, and you can start mourning for him the minute they express an interest … but a genuine EPL title contender club would never pick Eddie Howe with his current record, nor pluck him from Scotland no matter how well he is doing.

It’s an absolute non-starter.

The curious fact of it is that the higher profile a club is in England, and the higher opinion those in have of themselves, the less we have to worry about now or in the future.

A Super Club. Two Examples: Manchester City, Liverpool

The global super-clubs of Manchester City and Liverpool represent zero threat of us losing Eddie Howe at any point, except in a scenario where he actually takes to the Champions League final and wins it.

Because these clubs can afford to hire the very best managers in the world and that is the level of their ambition.

This is particularly bad news for a certain Steven Gerrard.

Ignore anybody who says that Liverpool might be interested in him for their manager’s job next.

He might get an interview out of courtesy but until he has accomplished much, much, much more in the game than spending his way to a title at Ibrox he won’t be considered a serious candidate no matter how many people promote that cause in the media.

Liverpool’s owners are hard-nosed realists and their ambition is boundless.

They can appoint any boss on the planet, and they would not entertain the idea.

This is even truer of Manchester City, who in hiring Guardiola went out and got the biggest name in the global game to come and work for them, and with the wealth they have backing them it’s very doubtful that they would ever settle for less.

We all have a sense of realism about Howe; he’s not at the level of the real top tier clubs in England who can go and get the finished article in the dugout as easily as they can afford it out on the pitch, and a few missteps aside – made out of mad loyalty to former players, a mistake we’ve also repeated – they will go for the biggest names in the business because they can.

The idea that a super-club might come for a Scottish based manager is so outlandish that it shouldn’t be taken remotely seriously … I actually laugh when I hear this talk about Gerrard because it has no basis in reality whatsoever.

So Realistically, What Are We Worried About?

If Howe is given control, as he allegedly wants, we shouldn’t be losing this guy to a Crystal Palace or a Newcastle or any of those others mid-to-bottom options whose jobs might come up in England either now or in the future.

If we give this man a chance to build a dynasty, win trophies and manage in the Champions League he will pick us over those teams.

Unless all he cares about is money, and in that case we’re not missing out.

Those guys do not win major honours. It’s the guys who nurse genuine footballing ambitions, ambitions to win things, ambitions to have their names resonate, who accomplish that.

The one set of clubs who should present a realistic test for us in our ability to hire, or keep, a guy like this are the European challenger cohort. Below that and we should be confident of keeping our man. Higher than that, and he’ll need to have achieved something momentous for those clubs to want him in the first place.

We are realistic about where Howe sits in the ranks of top managers; he’s a great option for us, but he is not out of the highest drawer. That’s where our advantage here lies … should we press it.

The Howe debate can’t last much longer.

Celtic cannot afford to wait on him, and every day that this matter drags on makes us look more ridiculous … and in truth, it’s starting to make Howe look the same.

I’ll be writing more about this later, but there are now serious questions being asked about him by people up here and in England … not credible people but the negative headlines have started to come and issues over his “mentality” won’t help him.

If the issue is his coaches Celtic fans are on his side, as we’ll be on the side of any coach who comes in and who wants to bring his own people with him. Howe is entitled to ask for that, and to be frank it would be ridiculous for our board to deny him that.

If the people he wants are qualified – and he won’t want people who aren’t – then any opposition to it is absolutely unacceptable; Celtic fans will not trust any appointment which has one of the current coaching team forced on a new manager as his assistant.

It would reek of meddling; the sort we should be putting in the rear-view mirror when Lawwell goes.

Putting that aside though, I think we should be confident of getting him, if he’s the sort of manager who has ambitions within the game beyond merely existing in the EPL and making the money.

That people are actually questioning that is bad for him.

Worse are those who wonder if the job at Celtic is too big for him. If that narrative takes root any scenario where he takes a lesser job will see that question haunt him for a long time.

He, too, has a big choice to make here, and a lot of downside if he makes the wrong one.

Yet we’re the ones worrying here?

Dear God, what have we come to?

We should close this deal this week … or walk away from it completely.