Do Martin’s latest comments seem strange? Welcome to Celtic’s Summer 2026.

I am always uncomfortable when I am writing from my gut. It’s my equivalent of all those people out there attempting to be body language experts, looking at the way players celebrate and stuff to see if they are unhappy. I do not have the benefit of witchcraft or ginger hair either, so I cannot fall back on those senses.

But I do study language and the way it is used. I do study forms of words, and I know that Martin O’Neill is a great lover of words. Brendan Rodgers was as well, and sometimes it helped to read between the lines. I am not suggesting that Martin O’Neill speaks in code, but language is revealing in many different ways.

O’Neill’s comments on the latest Celtic transfer link were probably meant to shut a story down rather than open one up.

That is worth saying right at the start.

I may be reading too much into this. In fact, there is every chance that I am. Managers get asked about players all the time. They have to bat away rumours, dodge traps, avoid confirming negotiations and stop themselves from giving agents, selling clubs and journalists anything useful.

O’Neill has been around football long enough to know how that game works, and he is far too experienced to start confirming or denying every name thrown at him during a transfer window. So let us caveat this properly.

I found the wording strange. That is all. But in the event that it does mean something, let us examine it properly. That is the sensible approach, I think.

It does not mean there is some smoking gun buried in one throwaway line. It may simply mean O’Neill was laughing off another random rumour in a summer where Celtic have been linked with every player who has ever successfully completed a five-yard pass in Europe.

But the wording is strange. And because Martin knows how to use words as well as anyone who has ever sat in the dugout at Celtic Park, I look at them and think, “Hmmm …”

Reports in France have linked Celtic with Stade de Reims midfielder Mory Gbane. Asked about it, O’Neill said he had not read the reports, adding that there are so many players being mentioned that he cannot keep confirming or denying every single one. Fair enough. That part is straightforward. That is what managers say in July. Nothing to see there.

Then came the line that caught the attention.

“Even my board members are saying, ‘Who are they?’”

Now, again, this might be nothing. It might simply be O’Neill making a joke about the rumour mill. It might mean the board are seeing the same wild links as the rest of us and shrugging their shoulders. It might mean the names appearing in the press are not Celtic targets at all. If that is the case, then the line is harmless enough.

But it is still a very odd thing to say.

Nevertheless, at a well-run club, with a clearly understood recruitment structure, nobody would even spend much time thinking about comments like these. But this has been One Weird Summer, and we are all entitled to be suspicious.

At a well-run club, the manager would know who was on the list. The recruitment team would know who was on the list. The football department would know which positions were being prioritised. The board would know which deals required money, approval or negotiation. Everyone would understand where rumour ended and club business began.

At Celtic, because everything feels so opaque, even a passing line like this becomes something supporters start examining like a coded message from inside a bunker.

That is not healthy. But then this whole summer has not painted a picture of an institution which fully knows what it is doing.

It is not healthy that we have to wonder whether O’Neill is joking, irritated, out of the loop or subtly telling us something about the recruitment process.

It is not healthy that a manager saying “even my board members are asking who these players are” can be read in three or four different ways.

It is not healthy that every sentence from the manager now feels like it might contain some clue about what is happening behind the curtain.

That is what happens when a club communicates badly for long enough. People start reading smoke signals.

To be clear, I am not saying Mory Gbane is a serious target. I am not saying Celtic are in advanced talks. I am not saying the board do not know who the club is looking at. I am certainly not saying O’Neill has exposed some grand internal breakdown.

But I am saying this: the line lands awkwardly because of the wider context.

And the wider context is grim.

This has been one of the strangest Celtic summers I can remember. Deals have dragged. Options have lapsed. Players have been linked, discussed and half-dismissed. The manager has spoken publicly about needing players. Supporters have watched obvious squad issues remain unresolved. Even good news has somehow arrived wrapped in confusion. The club signed Camilo Duran and still managed to make the announcement process feel like waiting for final exam results.

So when O’Neill makes a comment like this, supporters do not hear it in isolation. They hear it against the backdrop of everything else.

They hear it after weeks of wondering who is actually driving recruitment. They hear it after months of asking what the structure looks like. They hear it after years of watching Celtic make simple things look complicated. They hear it after being told to trust the process when nobody can adequately explain what the process is.

That is why the wording matters. Not because it proves anything by itself.

But because it fits too easily into an existing pattern.

It’s the separation, you see? It’s the suggestion implied in those words that the executive and the football department are not on the same page. As if one of them might be off doing things the other does not know about. It suggests a disconnect. Subtly. Not with fanfare. And perhaps not even consciously made. Just a hint that both sides are working on different things, for different ends, instead of working as one.

And that is where Celtic have created their own problem. At a better-run club, this quote would be a non-issue. Everyone would shrug and say, “The manager is batting away another rumour.” End of story. Nobody would be tempted to draw conclusions from it, because the wider structure would inspire confidence.

At Celtic, confidence in the structure is exactly what is missing.

That is why ambiguity becomes dangerous. That is why odd wording gets analysed. That is why a harmless comment can suddenly feel loaded. The club has created an environment where supporters are constantly trying to work out whether the people in charge are organised, aligned and serious.

That should not be the case.

A serious football operation should not leave its own support wondering whether the manager, board and recruitment staff are all looking at the same list. It should not leave every transfer link floating in a fog of uncertainty. It should not make supporters feel as though the only way to understand what is happening is to interpret press conference remarks like ancient scripture.

Maybe this is nothing. Honestly, it probably is nothing.

Maybe O’Neill was just making light of the absurd number of names being thrown around. Maybe the board members he mentioned were simply laughing at wild speculation. Maybe Gbane is no more a Celtic target than half the other names that have appeared this summer. But Celtic have made themselves impossible to trust on these things, and that is the point.

Is it possible the directors are pursuing one set of targets and the management team are working on another? At any other club that would be inconceivable. But this is not any other club. What we have learned following Celtic in the last year is that nothing is too daft to be true, nothing too absurd to be real, nothing too dysfunctional to be happening right in front of your eyes.

We have seen it all these past twelve months.

That is not the fault of supporters. It is the fault of a club that has spent too long operating behind a wall of silence, delay and confusion. Celtic have created the conditions in which every comment is dissected, every rumour is weighed and every public remark from the manager sounds like it might be revealing something accidentally.

So no, I would not build a conspiracy around O’Neill’s words. We have to examine them because you pretty much have to examine everything Celtic is doing right now. It does not mean it is another sign of trouble. But it might be, and that is the point, because Celtic have reached a place where words like these get your antennae twitching.

That is the real issue.

At a better-run club, this would be background noise. At Celtic, right now, even background noise sounds like another warning bell.

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