Celtic managerial links have become Six Degrees of Silliness.

In 1994, following a widely publicised interview in which Kevin Bacon joked that he had worked with almost everyone in Hollywood, a newsgroup popped up proposing a theory. It suggested that Bacon was, as they put it, at the centre of the universe.

What followed was one of those strange cultural quirks that refuses to die.

Borrowing from the broader idea of Six Degrees of Separation, it focused on Bacon’s career and claimed that you could link him to anyone in Hollywood within six steps.

I have always found the theory fascinating. Not just the Kevin Bacon version, but the idea itself. That you can link any two people in the world through a chain of connections. People you know, people they know, and so on.

Is it scientifically sound? On the face of it, it sounds absurd. And yet, every time I’ve tried to disprove it, I’ve failed.

I even tested it recently. I asked ChatGPT to throw names at me. It was surprisingly easy to get from me to Keanu Reeves, even going through Bacon for the fun of it. It was just as easy to get to Kim Jong-un.

That’s what makes it so compelling. It feels ridiculous, but it works.

Modern networking has only made it easier. Platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn have shrunk the world even further. There is a wealth of research backing the idea that human networks are far more tightly connected than we instinctively think.

So it is no surprise to see this theory creeping into football discourse, especially when it comes to the question of who might be the next Celtic manager.

Even if, in this context, it is slightly mad.

What sparked this for me was the suggestion that the Motherwell manager is somehow “linked” to Celtic through Shaun Maloney, having worked with his assistant briefly in England.

When you see that kind of thing, you have to wonder whether the people writing it have ever heard of the Kevin Bacon game, or whether they are simply desperate for content.

Because this is not even six degrees of separation. You could link almost anyone in football to Celtic in fewer steps than that.

Football is a small world. It lends itself to this kind of exercise automatically.

It is remarkable how many people are trying to draw connections that do not mean anything.

Equally, it is remarkable how many are willing to treat those connections as if they carry weight.

If I can get from myself to Keanu Reeves, and equally to Kim Jong-un, then linking a football manager to Celtic is not exactly a challenge.

Of course you can establish a connection between the Motherwell manager and Celtic. There are probably dozens of them. The only question is whether you have the time or the inclination to go looking for them.

As a parlour game, it’s great fun. As analysis, it is meaningless.

You could do the same thing with anyone. You could link Celtic to José Mourinho, to Jürgen Klopp, to Pep Guardiola. It would not mean any of them are about to become our next manager.

A connection is not a story.

I do not know whether Celtic are actively searching for a new manager right now. Nor do I know whether the board are waiting to see how the season plays out. I would hope that groundwork is already being done, that candidates have been identified and conversations have taken place.

But I cannot say that with any certainty.

What I can say is this. If you want tenuous, I can do tenuous.

I will not even link a manager to Celtic. I will link him to me.

Here is how Xabi Alonso connects to me in six steps.

Start with my dad, who knows Jim McInally through connections on our supporters’ bus.

McInally played alongside Stuart Pearce at Nottingham Forest.

Pearce played under Kenny Dalglish at Newcastle.

Dalglish managed Steven Gerrard at Liverpool.

Gerrard played with Alonso.

That’s six steps.

I did not want to go through Gerrard, but it is the cleanest route.

If I can make that connection in six steps, then who in football cannot be linked to Celtic in the same number?

This is the point.

There are real stories, and there are non stories.

Linking Jens Berthel Askou to Celtic via Shaun Maloney is not a story. It is filler.

Some will say this piece is filler too. It is not. It makes a serious point.

We need to be better and more serious than this. We need to stop chasing shadows.

As for the next Celtic manager, I am already resigned to not liking the appointment, whoever it is not because I know who it’s going to be but because I do not trust this board to get it right.

But we are not going to get any closer to understanding who that person might be by playing parlour games and dressing them up as insight.

This is just Six Degrees of Silliness.

Choose The CelticBlog as a ‘Preferred Source’ on Google News for quick access to the news you value.