By the time I publish this, Jonny Hayes might have been confirmed as the new Under 18 manager of Celtic. It certainly looks like it is in the offing.
It is not an appointment which impresses me in the slightest, and having already written about this when he was linked with the role, and having condemned the shortlist of himself and Charlie Mulgrew as being woefully inadequate, I have no intention of pretending to have changed my mind or been won over. This appointment sums up the way we do things at so many levels of the club. The lack of imagination and ambition is appalling.
Look, I have nothing against Jonny Hayes. Why would I?
I’m sure he’s a decent enough person and has some qualities which led Aberdeen to believe that he was worthy of the job coaching their youths and I am sure he has certain qualities which lead somebody at Celtic to think the same thing.
But I’m left cold by it nonetheless. It’s a cheap appointment. It’s a low-ambition appointment. It is one that will not, in any meaningful way, progress our under 18 setup and that’s bad news for everyone because that is where players take the most important steps on their journey towards our first team. It is not an area of the club where you just throw a job to one of your mates.
We have too much of this already, and a lot of people don’t see what the big deal is. There are some people who will be misty eyed over the return of a favourite son; that’s Hallmark card sentimental claptrap which has got no place in this discussion whatsoever.
Whenever we do something like this, I ask myself two questions; first, what are this individual’s qualifications for the job?
And Jonny Hayes is 36, he’s only just retired from playing, and aside from his coaching badges – which you or I could apply for and work our way through – his sole qualifications are a few months with the Aberdeen youth team. That’s it.
That’s the basis on which we’re on the brink of handing him an epic responsibility with wide-ranging implications for the future development of young players at this club, a club which already doesn’t produce nearly enough of them for the first team.
That he’s well liked within Celtic both in the club and in the stands is of zero relevance to that at all, and yet that seems to be the over-riding factor in giving him the gig. He has no body of work upon which we can assess him. He has no achievements as a coach which we can compare to the records of others. Hiring him cannot be justified on the basis of his experience.
The second question is this; is this the best person we could have gotten? And since we all know that the answer to that is a resounding no, based just on his lack of proper experience in a similar position, that begs a third question; why the Hell are we hiring this guy then?
And that’s a question that can only be answered by those inside the club, and they don’t think we’re worthy of offering such explanations to.
They will never tell us on what basis they made this decision, or what criteria they were working to.
But it does not appear that the obvious qualifications formed any part of their thinking.
Their judgement is suspect.
The way this club continues to operate is suspect.
The way it brings people in is suspect.
It doesn’t seem to me that the “global search” for excellence extends much further than whose names are in the little black book. That we even interviewed Charlie Mulgrew for this role when he has no experience of coaching at all, and that he made the short list shows you that the people who ran this “search” didn’t do much more than look out the window.
It reeks of amateurism, cronyism and even nepotism, and no matter how many harsh lessons there are – and the Mark Lawwell one should be seared across the consciousness of everyone who had a hand in it – these people never learn and never stop doing this stuff.
Celtic is run as their own little personal plaything and this stuff continues to drag us down.
Ohhh well at least we haven’t signed him as a left back .
Some very deranged comments here re Jihney Hayes . Do these armchair coaching experts know what he has or is studying for ? Sounds like the aamm same old sack the board chorus ? Whilst they have their faults they have presided over nearly two decades of supremacy ,success and financial stability. Maybe time to give it a fecking rest ?
Of course we know what he studied for. As I said in the piece, you or I could take that course and if we passed it, would we then be qualified to coach Celtic’s under 18 team?
Because THAT is what we’re talking about here. With NO EXPERIENCE as a coach at a major club there is ZERO justification WHATSOEVER for making him the head of our youth coaching team.
I know EXACTLY what his coaching qualifications are. He has no experience to bolster them. This is really simple. Is he the best candidate we could get? The answer is no. So on what basis was he hired?
Well Said James, a very Smart Answer. It is Clear to Me this is a CHEAP option by the Share Price Driven Celtic Board.
Here’s a wee idea maybe give the man a chance before you trash his reputation before he’s even got his feet in the door.Or perhaps find out at least if it was a BR decision or not
He doesn’t have a reputation. He has literally never had a job remotely comparable to this one.
That is the point of the piece. His feet should never be IN the door without that experience.
It doesn’t really matter to me who made the decision. It’s the wrong decision.
Think ur way off the mark Fred, we dominated in Scotland cause every other team is crap, Europe proved how average we are against class opponents and the board have hung onto the fact that if we stay ahead of Rangers its job done.Well i think most supporters know this is a short sighted ambition and we a laughing stock in Europe and that must change.
We need experts to run our academy not guys who are ex players with zero experience.
Bring back Damien Duff
A great opportunity for Hayes but I thought when Kewel was appointed he was totally under qualified but Ange wanted him and maybe Brendan is happy with Hayes
Take a holiday James. I played v Hayes about 16/17 years.ago and boy ripped me apart. Off the field he was class.. If you don’t want a top ex pro managing your youth team tell me what you want??
So let me get this straight … because you PLAYED against the guy 16 years ago and he tore you to ribbons he’s … qualified to be our youth couch?
How exactly does that work?
I WANT A QUALIFIED EXPERIENCED COACH. HOW DIFFICULT IS THIS TO COMPREHEND?
SPOT ON SIR!….
Just read your blog but nowhere in your article do you reveal your undoubtedly unquestionable experience in football coaching, some of the best football coaches haven’t had glittering careers, Ange as the most recent example, Celtic don’t just pluck a name from job center looking for work section and Jonny Hayes like John Kennedy could be an outstanding coach , good luck to him and for the sake of Celtic , unless you can say with certainty that Jonny is the wrong choice then stop spouting total nonsense.?Hail Hail
He’s not qualified. There are people we could have hired who actually are.
Therefore he’s the wrong choice. If you think our club should hire rank amatuers in every position then don’t complain if the manager gets them for the first team squad.
I genuinely do not get what people are not seeing here.
? Exactly!! Same here
James if you think johnny hayes is a bad signing wait until end off summer and see the shite they buy brendan again
Intelligent Answer!!!!!
You`d think Celtic would learn some common sense, especially after almost 60 years. I
remember around that time they, believe it or not, asked an old groundsman by the name of
Jimmy Gribben for his advice in naming a person who would be a fit for Celtic and he named
an elderly miner from FFfllllaannnechhly, or a name like that, to play centre half. Talk about
rage among the support. Some of them even burned their green-dyed shirts (you couldn`t buy strips in those days). To make matters worse, they gave this big gommerrel a coaching job
when he retired and, to cut a long story short, he finished up as manager. If I remember
correctly his name was Stean, or maybe Steam. What a laugh he turned out to be. He
didn`t even have the qualifications that Johnny Hayes has even. If you knew the correct air
pressure of an old leather T- Ball in those days that was qualification enough.
Of all the blogs you’ve written James I really didn’t think this would be the one to explode in the comments like this (not in a bad way). I think the statement is fairly clear or how I’ve taken it in anyway.
If his name wasn’t Johnny Hayes his CV wouldn’t get him a job at Celtic. As you say minimal to no experience & only just qualified. If his name didn’t bring back the nostalgia fuzzies nobody would be happy about the appointment.
Hopefully he works out for the better of the club, although that in itself is also bad for the club because they don’t see the initial error & won’t see this as getting lucky but as great business acumen.
I think what people are saying James is that the appt of an under 18 coach isn’t very high up the agenda of supporters and also that you may being over critical of a highly thought of ex senior professional player.
To say this board have been a bit cautious and made foolish appts in the past is an understatement, that is what you get when most of them are Accountants and Lawyers, but we can’t argue against the fact that this Century has been the most successful era domestically in Celtic’s history. We just have to look across the river to see the damage that a inept board can do
This Celtic board ain’t going anywhere, I’m not saying they should get a free pass and if they’ve got any sense they’ll open the purse strings a bit to compete a bit better in the new format Champions League. We’ve got to be realistic and realise that at this time in Football history Celtic are a medium sized fish swimming among financial sharks and surviving pretty well.
The appointment of a under 18 coach isn’t a big deal as far as most supporters go.