“He’s been brilliant to work with,” Neil Lennon said at today’s Mainstream Media Conference from Lennoxtown that was dominated, as you would expect, with one story, the news that broke first thing this morning that Peter Lawwell is to retire from his position as the Celtic CEO on 30 June after 17 years leading the club.
“We’ve had our fall-outs over the piece but he’s been a huge positive influence on my career and many others,” Lennon added. There was no news at all on his own position at the club and whether it would be strengthen, weakened or unaffected by the decision of the CEO to call time himself on his reign in the top job. You got the feeling that the journalists from the MSM were a little too scared to ask and no-one from the Celtic fans media was invited to participate. Maybe that will change under Dominic McKay who has a background in communications.
“He’s a huge loss. Every decision he made he thought was best for the club. He was devoted to the club and I think he’ll be a huge miss,” Lennon added. “I was still playing when he came back. Player, coach, manager, we’ve been through a lot together, as well as other managers like Ronnie, Tony and Brendan.
“The success the club has had during his reign is absolutely phenomenal.
“I’m sad to see him go but 17 years is a huge amount of time for a job as pressured as that. I can’t speak for fans and how they perceive other people’s record at the club. What I do know is that in a very highly-pressurised job he fought a lot of battles for the club, won a lot of battles for the club. On and off the field we’ve made enormous strides in the last 17 years.
“He knew he had to make decisions that wouldn’t be popular but the overriding theory behind it was that it was the best thing for the club at all times.
“There’s no question for me that he always put the club first, whether it be popular with people or not. That’s the strength of the man. A strong leader and a very good presence and influence for everyone around the club.”
Asked to name Lawwell’s main achievements in his role at CEO at Celtic, Lennon found that an easy task to accomplish. “You’ve got three Champions League last 16s, 13 league titles, a quadruple treble, wins over Barcelona, Manchester United, Lazio.
“You’ve got Van Dijk, Forster, Wanyama, Tierney, Dembele, all these players who’ve come in and enhanced the club on the field and then left for vast amounts of money. Only in the last couple of days we’ve taken a young player from Manchester City and sold him for a huge amount of money.
“It’s phenomenal the work that he’s put in at the club. You look around the stadium and the walkways and it’s beautiful. It’s in magnificent condition.
“Dominic has big shoes to fill. I’ve seen the club in worse straits than it is now.”
Watch Neil Lennon’s Fan-free Mainstream Media Conference from earlier today below…
Would have to differ with Lennie with regards to Lawwells success in the recent past albeit the player sell on in the main has been pretty good but our our European efforts have been woeful and the buck has to stop with manager and Peter but I wish him well.
Celtic in football terms have imploded to such an extent in just one half of one season that relatively speaking it can be compared to the collapse of the Soviet Union or 9/11.
You can big up all the domestic success you wish but every single one of them out with Dalgleish, Larsson and Lambert, by definition, stand freezing in the shadow of Jock Stein and the Lions who are the true creators of the international brand called Celtic.
Lawwell? Was all ways about Lawwell. Do not be deluded into believing otherwise.
Lennon? Never possessed the intellectual nous to satisfy the aspirations of the people who really matter at Celtic, the season ticket holders and small shareholders.
For those of us who were in the Jungle in the 1970’s & 80’s, we all carry the scars. Lennons tribulations are not exceptional.
Desmond? He never once bought a share in Celtic that did not yield a dividend/ ROI. Anyone who believes otherwise is deluded.
He is an Irish public school and university educated individual. He earned his initial pot from the Kabul Stock Exchange during the Afghan alliance with the Soviet Union (work that one out at your leisure).
He makes money, lots of it, but his people never left Donegal with nothing but the clothes on their back for Glasgow because they were too poor to afford steerage to North America.
He is just a.n.other billionaire with a football club. They buy them because no one would ever know they were billionaires otherwise.
If he finds the 4th/5th generations of the Donegal Diaspora distasteful he can always sell his shares to them and bugger off. Just like the first time, we would buy them at a much greater financial burden to ourselves than he ever suffered.
Better still offer them to the The Celtic Trust at a reasonable price and we can run the club by committee with consensus just as we did at St. Mary’s, Calton, Glasgow in 1887 before the shysters, carpet baggers, snake oil salesmen, booze hawkers et all took control.