Irrational backlash aside, Brendan’s as elite a manager as Celtic can hope for

The embarrassment of a 7-1 thumping in European competition can be enough for even the fairest minded of supporters to lash out irrationally…

In the hours following Celtic’s defeat in Dortmund there appeared on social media at least to be a lot of anger directed at the manager. Some of that of course was not exclusively due to Tuesday night’s result, instead it felt like ‘Rodgers does Europe’ was a film we’d watched before, several times, and it had left mental scarring.

Watching it again, when we’d told ourselves it would be different this time, left many wishing to lash out, even for some to be questioning Rodgers’ very employment as the Celtic boss. Yet that bubble of belief was in the main a self-creation.

A fantastic start to the season had led to many -and even the manager perhaps – considering whether this squad of players could see pre-season form against Chelsea and Manchester City translating from a transatlantic jolly to the rarefied atmosphere of the Champions League, 80,000 pumped up Germans and a legendary Yellow Wall. Turns out it didn’t translate after all. And when it didn’t the manager knew where his squad stood and would be forced to take stock, but he knew he had to try.

Meanwhile the feelings of hurt and shame led to some within the support to play the blame game and revisit old feuds. Of course, much of that was initial hysteria and outside the social media bubble, where people perhaps debate less reasonably than they would in a face-to-face discussion.

As the days passed the negative discourse appears to have cooled and the realisation that, in Europe’s premier competition, a hiding for any club outside the big four leagues is something of a certainty occasionally has permeated through most reasonable minds.

Of course, there are some within the support and in Celtic fan media who have never forgiven Rodgers for his Leicester flit and I wonder if some of those ever will. There are also those who feel Lawwell vs Rodgers is a binary choice and some continue to fight that fight like the Japanese soldiers who continued to follow orders long after World War II was over, in some valiant attempt to continue to appease a master who had long since given up on that fight.

In Brendan Rodgers Celtic have a manager as close to an elite level coach as we are likely to ever have. Yes, he has his faults. He often responds to questions whilst rebutting his own previous stance, says stuff just to get through a sticky situation without considering he may be held to account for his contradictions – and perhaps not even caring much as to how that presents or how infuriating and frustrating it can be for some.

Rodgers has also built something of a reputation for his love of a pound note, but in football I’d argue that’s par for the course rather than an outlier. His European record on the road doesn’t read well at Champions League level, he’s viewed as tactically stubborn and his eye for a player is a mixed bag at best.

Meanwhile Roders’ ability to manage up the club hierarchy has been questioned at Liverpool, Celtic and at Leicester and not without good reason, but then show me a perfect football manager and I’ll show you one outside our financial reach.

Rodgers is a manager who has his domestic record undermined somewhat, perhaps due to perceived European failings, but this is the manager who gave us the Invincibles, made Trebles a common occurrence and has a Glasgow Derby record that no-one could match. If all of that was so easy then why did so many managers prior to Rodgers fail to deliver a similar return?

Outside of Celtic, Rodgers was a slip away from delivering Liverpool a Premier League title, he took Leicester to an FA Cup success, against that season’s Champions League winners and finished 5th in the Premier League in successive seasons. He also reached the semi-final of the Conference League.

If Celtic went back into the managerial market looking for a successor to Rodgers, we couldn’t dream of attracting a manager with such a record on the wages we could offer.

Last season was a slow start and once again theRangers were coming. The Celtic support mourned the loss of Ange for many months, perhaps not quite understanding that so too were the players and staff behind the scenes. Add to that Jota was sold, Carl Starfelt asked for an exit and Aaron Mooy retired.

Rodgers was left to contend with a summer recruitment that had already been agreed under a head of football operations who didn’t cut the mustard and the manager tried every which way but loose to give many of those players multiple opportunities. However, the fact is he was dealt a duff hand by a recruitment team he was assured was up to the task.

The Board and the Green Brigade picked a fight with each other , the atmosphere at Celtic Park soured, and we added our own problems to those not of our own making.

Rodgers then hoped to get to January and fortify his squad, instead the Chairman had to publicly apologise for leaving their £3m a season manager with successive transfer window failings. By the time Rodgers had worked out the less than 15 players he could place in his circle of trust, a series of injuries slowed momentum until the stuttering led to what felt like a stop with a home defeat to Hearts.

Many managers would have wilted under that pressure. Instead, Rodgers’ experience of not only coaching Celtic but also managing Scottish football and all its idiosyncrasies came to the fore. The manager circled the wagons, pushed his players to call on their title winning muscle memory – and set about emboldening them further by utilising his own. The result? Another title success when even a great deal of our own support had thrown in the towel.

This season the transfer window has been a success, in terms of numbers, and most new signings hit the ground running. The squad started the season on fire on the back of a confidence building pre-season, where the manager admitted he used those City and Chelsea fixtures as a blueprint for the Champions League.

Yet much of those signings were delayed, far too long in fact, for them to be bedded into the squad in time to be ready for top level opponents. It looked, despite money spilling from the club accounts, that the club held fire on too much spend until the Matt O’Riley money was banked – when suddenly purse strings burst open.

That delay led to Auston Trusty making his second appearance out of position away in Dortmund, Arne Engels still learning on the job, Adam Idah still feeling a lack of a pre-season and Alex Valle still learning where the cafeteria and toilets are when a trip to America may have helped some players be on more than nodding terms with their teammates.

Barring a new contract being agreed, Rodgers has said he’s here for three seasons (who knows if that will work out) and as we move towards the halfway point there are obvious signs of progress, this despite the challenge of only having one decent transfer window from three and even the successful window had in-built and arguably unnecessary delays.

Rodgers may not quite be making a silk purse from a sow’s ear but he must feel like it’s two steps forward and one back at times, after all he himself has stated the football operations and dealmaking has much room for improvement and hinted that his view may be replicated elsewhere within the club.

Dortmund was a punch to the guts, but Bratislava had hearts and hopes soaring amongst the support. Now we stand three points out of six, with possibly the toughest fixture played and a 10-point target perfectly achievable.

If Celtic make it to the top 24 and a play-off slot secured after January then few would argue that would not be classed as a success.

Rodgers himself asked he be judged at the end of eight Champions League games and not from one aberration away in Dortmund. I think he’s earned that right and if he’s successful fewer still wouldn’t consider a seven-goal kicking in Germany as a toll worth paying on the road to Champions League progression.

Niall J