Lawwell’s Defenders Are Getting In Their Excuses. Most Celtic Fans Are Just Glad He’s Gone.

Across Celtic cyberspace yesterday, there was a feeling akin to that which swept through our support on the day that Jock Brown resigned. Who else remembers that like it was yesterday? We were playing Dundee in the league and that story hit the airwaves and we went out and smashed them. The parallels with Wednesday’s result are obvious, although it was 6-1 that day and not 7-1. Rodgers side has that one beat by a single goal.

Did people inside Parkhead know that this announcement was coming? You know, I rather think that they did. Maybe that’s why the boss has a spring in his step right now. He sounded a lot more like the old Brendan Rodgers yesterday, didn’t he? Even some of the hacks had to admit that. The thing is, as good a day as yesterday was in that regard, it’s not over yet.

Here’s a funny thing about that day; the performance was the vindication of one man’s signing policy. Venglos’ day was made special by the performance of Lubo Moravcik, who had been much derided by certain know-(sod)-all elements in the media, particularly Keevins, whose criticism of that deal is still offensive all this years later. In the aftermath of the game, Venglos let the media know where they could stick their suggestion that he might have been as surprised as they were by the Slovak.

“I know who is a good player and who is not,” he said. “This is only a beginning. There will be more difficult games ahead but Lubomir can handle it.” Two weeks later, he ran the whole show as we smashed Rangers 5-1.

This resignation signifies not the success of a signing policy but the collapse of one, and a lot more besides. It is, in fact, the collapse of the strategy which underpins the signing policy. Since Lawwell junior has been in the building the signings have been primarily based on finding “value” in players to develop and sell, as if that was the purpose of it all.

But we’re a football team. Success is measured in trophies and accolades, not in bulging bank balances and in strong accounting statements. Those things are necessary if our club is to grow, but we have become obsessive about them and bent the football department towards that goal, which is a travesty and one we’ll continue to pay for.

Today there are plenty of stories in the public domain about how it is Lawwell himself who wanted to move on, and this is, in part, because Ange is no longer at the club. Unless Spurs intend to hire this guy, and I somehow very much doubt it, there’ll be no happy reunion there. So, he’ll need to find a comfort blanket somewhere else it seems to me.

Right from the start, this stuff about Ange wanting him at the club has had more holes in it than Swiss Cheese. If you accept that he had a wide remit at the City Group he wouldn’t have come across Ange more than a handful of times. This story that they worked together on transfer deals doesn’t stack up because Ange’s transfer business in Japan was paltry and insignificant. So, the connection between them both was tenuous at best.

This story that it was Ange who wanted him here is garbage. What did Ange care who was going to be at this club running transfer policy? He wasn’t intending to be here, and he’s made that clear. The club should have been well aware of that, as he’d turned down various contract offers. So, if they really did hire the head of recruitment with the manager in mind, when the manager wasn’t fully committed to the cause, it was the height of lunacy and proof in and of itself that the people running this weren’t exactly the smartest kids in the class.

He had to go. The summer window on its own was a confused mess where none of the constituent parts of the club were working together in synchronicity. But those above him allowed that situation to develop, and Daddy is a particular worry here. The strategy of selling our players over a certain age got underway the minute Lawwell Jnr was in the door; Giakoumakis and Juranovic were the first two players to go, and we got such lousy fees for them too.

The summer window did real damage to our season. That, coupled with the injury crisis, gave us the perfect storm; key players out for lengthy spells and sub-standard replacements who the manager didn’t rate and wasn’t prepared to play. It’s only now that he has his prototype striker that we look like a real threat going forward. The rest is a mess.

Yet for all that, the stories are already out there that Lawwell Jnr was some kind of genius after all. Some of them are even claiming that he was actually a success here! They’ve even started to push the narrative again that but for him and Daddy we’d never have got Ange because they were crucial to the process in employing him. There’s even a hint that Ange’s early signings were done through Mark Lawwell which is patently false.

These people have done real and serious damage to this club. Those who want to rewrite history are doing so with their fingers crossed, hoping that the manager they would otherwise be blaming turns things around and gives us a reprieve. One way or another though, Mark Lawwell is gone, and already the board apologists want to rewrite his history.

Hopefully they get a go at rewriting Daddy’s soon as well.