Celtic can get its dream boss, but it will cost more than money.

One of the recurring themes around Celtic right now is who the next manager is going to be. This is hardly a shock because that discussion has been ongoing for a while, we will have a vacancy at the end of the season if not before and everyone has their favourites, and plenty of supporters have already picked their dream candidate.

My own is Kieran McKenna.

There has been a lot of talk about him across Celtic fan sites. Paulina wrote a piece for this site arguing that if the board wants a unifying appointment, he is the guy. More than that, he is the sort of candidate around whom you could construct the entire football operation.

The obvious everyone’s talking about is problem is money.

Everyone knows that this is the area where McKenna may appear to be beyond Celtic’s reach. So let us do what few people have actually done properly and talk about the mechanics of a deal.

What would it really cost Celtic to get him?

At first glance, the numbers look absurd. McKenna was reportedly earning around £6 million a year at Ipswich, while compensation figures of around £8 million have been mentioned. Put those together and you are talking about somewhere close to £14 million just to secure him and guarantee the first year of his salary.

That sounds impossible.

But maybe it is not. Because those numbers … what are they?

McKenna did miraculous things at Ipswich, taking them from League One to the Premier League in successive seasons. Ipswich quite rightly believed they had one of the best young managers in the game and acted accordingly.

They paid him an enormous salary and protected themselves with a huge compensation figure because they knew exactly what might happen next. A wealthy Premier League club could come along and take him.

That is simply football reality.

If you have an elite young coach and one of the richer English clubs wants him badly enough, there is very little you can do except make sure they pay heavily for the privilege.

McKenna’s reported £6 million salary was part of that protection.

For context, Brendan Rodgers was the highest-paid manager in Celtic’s history on roughly a third of that.

But that creates an interesting problem for McKenna too.

English clubs have experienced this repeatedly with players. Once you start paying Premier League wages, you create an ecosystem in which only Premier League clubs can afford to buy from one another.

A middling midfielder earning £60,000 a week may suddenly become impossible to move to the Championship or to most clubs abroad. His salary has narrowed his market dramatically.

McKenna may now find himself in something similar.

Who, realistically, is paying him £6 million a year?

There are not many clubs outside the Premier League who can do it, and I am not even convinced every Premier League club would want to.

If Brighton or Brentford are paying a manager that kind of money, they are going to expect serious results. They are going to want European qualification, clear progress and evidence that the investment is worthwhile.

And once you reach the clubs which can easily afford £6 million a year plus a huge compensation package, another problem appears.

Those clubs can probably afford almost anyone.

If you are Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool or another club operating at that level, you can go into Europe and target a manager who has won major trophies, challenged for titles or built a stronger body of work at the highest level.

That is not an insult to McKenna.

It is just reality.

His achievements at Ipswich are outstanding, but his one Premier League season ended in relegation. For some clubs, rightly or wrongly, that will matter more than everything he achieved getting there.

So suddenly the question changes. Where is McKenna’s realistic market? That is where Celtic becomes interesting.

Because Celtic cannot match the Premier League pound for pound. We cannot offer £6 million a year as casually as some clubs down south can.

What we can offer is something different.

European football. A huge club. A massive support. The chance to build something rather than simply survive in mid-table.

A platform where success is measured in trophies, Champions League qualification and genuine domination.

McKenna may not get that at Brighton or Brentford. They may qualify for Europe occasionally, but they are not Celtic. That matters.

Then there is the compensation.

If the £8 million figure really is tied to the protection around his departure and reduces or disappears at the end of the season, then that is a diminishing asset for Ipswich.

Every month that passes reduces their leverage. If nobody comes in and pays the full amount, eventually they get nothing.

That makes the whole thing negotiable.

Celtic would not necessarily have to walk in and put £8 million on the table. You structure the deal. You offer Ipswich a substantial guaranteed figure now, with additional payments if McKenna achieves certain targets.

Champions League qualification? They get more. League titles? Potentially more again. That same principle can apply to McKenna’s salary.

Does Celtic have to pay him £6 million simply because Ipswich once did? I do not believe so. That figure was partly the cost of Ipswich protecting their manager from Premier League predators. It does not automatically become his permanent market value everywhere he goes next.

Could Celtic offer £2 million or £3 million a year, then build in enormous performance bonuses for Champions League qualification, domestic success and European progress?

Absolutely. If he succeeds spectacularly, let him earn spectacular money.

That is good business. And this is why the finances do not scare me nearly as much as the structure around the club.

Because if Celtic genuinely wanted Kieran McKenna, the harder conversation would not be about salary. It would be about everything else.

McKenna is not going to come here simply to operate inside the existing machinery.

He is not going to want to work in an environment where football strategy is confused, where recruitment lacks clarity, where the manager is expected to answer upwards to people without a coherent football vision, or where Dermot Desmond can intervene whenever he feels like it.

If Celtic want a manager like McKenna, then Celtic has to become a club worthy of a manager like McKenna. The football operation would have to be restructured around him. Recruitment. Analytics. Sports science. Coaching. Player development.

The relationship between manager and executives.

The whole thing.

That, to me, is the real hurdle. Not the money. Money is a negotiation. Compensation is a negotiation. Salary is a negotiation. Bonuses are a negotiation.

Structure is much harder because it requires people already inside Celtic to surrender control, change how they think and admit that the current model is not good enough.

And there is nothing this board seems to dislike more than the idea of someone inside Celtic becoming more important than they are.

That is why I do not think McKenna is financially impossible.

I think he is institutionally difficult.

Could Celtic get him? Yes, I genuinely think we could. Could we get him on £2 million to £3 million a year, with incentives taking that number significantly higher if he succeeds? I believe so. Would Ipswich negotiate rather than allow their compensation protection to disappear completely? I think they would have to.

But would McKenna come and work for this version of Celtic?

That is the question which worries me. The finances have never been the part which scares me. It is everything else.

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