Martin O’Neill feels that selling Celtic’s top-scorer, Mark Viduka, was the catalyst to making his team a success.
Viduka may not be all that popular at Parkhead and his temperament was certainly questionable, but he did boast a superb goalscoring record for the Hoops, hitting 30 goals in just 37 SPL games (1999/2000 season).
O’Neill joined the club with Celtic in disarray at this time. Viduka was promptly sold to Leeds for £6m, something which only dampened the mood of the support and losing your top goalscorer never normally bodes well. However, Martin O’Neill has explained to Sky Sports that selling Viduka allowed him to buy Chris Sutton, which helped his team immensely.
Speaking of the change at the club when Sutton came in, the Irishman said: “He was a brilliant partner for Henrik Larsson so that worked out terrifically. Henrik was in fantastic form that particular season. Sorry, he was in fantastic form every season that we had him. He really loved playing with Chris Sutton. Sutton was a top-class player, there was no doubt about it. He had won the title in England with Blackburn Rovers. Going forward we became much more potent then.”
Sutton would go on to score 86 goals in 199 games for Celtic, but he also played in a number of positions and complemented Larsson superbly when up top. Within a year of partnering the Swede, Larsson scored 53 goals in 50 games and scored more than 40 in two of the three subsequent seasons before moving to Barcelona.
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