Why Eddie Howe Must Stick to his Demands. It’s Not Simply a Privilege to Manage Celtic, Not Now

You know what, I admire the sentiment when it comes to John Hartson’s comments regarding the protracted search for Celtic’s next manager and specifically the request for Eddie Howe to get a hurry on. He very much sounded as if he was speaking as a man frustrated and one with an emotional attachment to Celtic as a club:

“Eddie Howe is privileged to be so sought after by Celtic,” Hartson told Go Radio. “Celtic is a global club. Massive fanbase all around the world, it’s a magnificent job.

“Especially now because you’ve got a big challenge. The challenge is to topple (the)Rangers who have just won the Premiership.

“Celtic have to respond and they have to make sure they get the right man in.

“Eddie Howe is um-ing and ah-ing, maybe he’s decided he may well be going somewhere else. If he thinks he’s got Celtic in the bag and he’s holding out for something else coming up then Celtic need to move on.”

But you know what Eddie Howe doesn’t have that emotional attachment, not yet anyway. What Eddie Howe sees is a big job, one with a chance to enhance a profile beyond an English Premier League mid-table reputation he has already forged, but one with problems. It is not simply a privilege to be asked to manage Celtic. To say so is simply playing to the gallery.

Howe has already been a miracle worker once, but he knows himself that when he marched through the English leagues he got more than a leg-up, and he also knows he’ll need that level of support again to accomplish his objectives at Celtic.

He’ll be expected to return Celtic to Scottish Premiership dominance within 12 months and within three years have Celtic front and centre as a side organised for Champion’s League football when the big changes – and enhanced riches on offer – kick in in 2024. And in the meantime, ensure Celtic have post-Christmas European football, via at least the Europa League.

At Bournemouth he saved the club from extinction, but as he progressed from the boondocks to the Promised Land he did so with a hefty wedge of Russian investment and a footballing operation, though influenced by himself, aided by a multitude of individuals who helped him on the way.

Now you’d assume Howe wants that again, a team and a process he knows he can trust to deliver and one that will assist him to transfer the alchemist touch from the saving and then massive growth of a seaside English club on to the sleeping European giant of Celtic. That is not a privilege alone, it is a mammoth task.

Celtic is a job with great demands, intense scrutiny and a daily invasion into every facet of a manager’s life on and off the park. Howe will know that. He will also know having had a look in the media, never mind the due diligence he will have carried out, that the task ahead is huge.

Massive cultural change beyond the appointment of a single manager/head coach is needed at a club that appears from the outside looking in as if it has fallen off a cliff, when instead it is worse than that, a managed decline has seeped into every facet and needs addressing.

Howe will see a club that hasn’t won a knockout European tie bar qualifiers since 2004, nor heard the Champions league music since 2016, but one that is asking him to ensure on his watch the club he is joining is not only in a position to qualify but ready to compete with those extra riches due in 2024.

He will see a club, as things stand, who need players but have no manager, need a manager but have no Director of Football and need a Director of Football but have only just employed the CEO who knits it altogether. One from Scottish Rugby and no football experience, one who will need some time to settle in shall we say, and has only just received his key card and worked out where the cafeteria is.

Howe will also be aware from conversations with a previous manager that a culture of micromanagement will need to be overcome and the chap who developed that environment, one he’s been told is leaving, is showing the new guy expected to change that culture just how things are done at Celtic. If you have no emotional attachment to Celtic, it perhaps doesn’t appear to be the privilege John Hartson or you and I may see it as at this particular moment. Perhaps we should be taking a step back from our emotional attachments and looking at just what any new man is being tasked with.

Yet none of that seems to have scared Eddie Howe, he certainly hasn’t discounted himself and it appears from information coming out the club that Howe had agreed in principle to take on the task. He apparently impressed Dermot Desmond so much that our principal shareholder preferred Eddie to Keane. It is no mean feat to change Desmond’s mind.

But Howe is no fool, he knows what he needs to do the job and he’s asked for a lot of assistance. You’d assume a lot of that help is employed at his previous club and elsewhere. Guys in the midst of a challenge to get to the play-offs in the Championship, men the Celtic board may now be doing their own due diligence on and some where there may be a difference of opinion, and even if there is a simple trust in Eddie’s choices Celtic need to tread patiently.

Our need may be acute but so is Bournemouth’s fighting as they are for entry back to the riches of the English Premier league. Do we really think the south coast club would counter approaches to staff at this juncture? Do we even think those staff would welcome it at this moment, hoping as we would that we are targeting consummate professionals for Celtic brave new dawn?

John Hartson is right Celtic is a global club, the fanbase is massive and it surely is a magnificent job, but Neil Lennon jumped at it with no demands and was left twisting in the wind, Brendan Rodgers found promises were broken and interference was rife.

If Howe wants to ensure he gives himself every chance in this job, he will have demands, those demands will undoubtedly centre on his own staff and many of those are involved at the business end of their own seasons and focused, as we hope they will be eventually at Celtic, entirely on their current responsibilities.

If Howe backs himself, he’ll know his limitations, where he needs the help, what he needs to get the job done and who he wants to do it. Celtic may well find then that they are looking to negotiate five, six, seven deals on top of Howe’s and Howe may even want to see that finalised structure as we all would, one we appear to be scrambling around to conclude, before he recommends this job to all those guys he’s going to ask to uproot themselves and their families from and join him at one of the most pressured jobs in football.

So, whilst I admire John Hartson’s sentiment the playing of the ‘what is there to think about, this is The Celtic’ card, anyone who has been paying attention to Celtic’s gradual decline knows there is a lot to think about, a lot of assurances required. And if Celtic have targeted a man asking for all of that to be in place before putting pen to paper that will do for me.

Celtic are a romantic club, but there is no room for romance when it comes to someone choosing the club. I want a demanding manager laying out stipulations prior to taking the job and then continuing those demands into the job itself, asking tough questions of others and pushing standards every day. I don’t want someone who says ‘Celtic, yes please’ because such a person will be pliable and will not challenge when needed.

If Eddie Howe’s demands cannot be met then Celtic will need to walk away sooner rather than later, we all appreciate time is ticking. But Howe should stand by what he feels needs to carry out the job and not move an inch. If he does, we’ll get a man in post who won’t simply see the job as a privilege he will see it as a challenge, with expectations and will make the necessary demands every day. I’ll take that over any manager who simply sees the institution of Celtic as the attraction and takes the job because he’s chuffed to be asked to manage Celtic, we need more than that.

Niall J