Martin O’Neill would do well to watch his language during a very tense time for Celtic fans. Dermot Desmond does NOT own OUR club…

At this moment in time, Dermot Desmond is a majorly divisive figure at Celtic.

In what is shaping up to be one of the worst summer transfer windows on record, Desmond is doing nothing to help Martin O’Neill when it comes to rebuilding his squad.

And the more we listen to Martin O’Neill in his interviews, the more it seems that he is in the thrall of the absentee landlord.

O’Neill’s language gives the impression that it is he who owes Desmond something, rather than the other way around.

Because let’s get something straight here, Desmond owes Martin O’Neill everything.

So much, that Martin should be in a position to demand whatever he wants from the ‘double billionaire’.

Dermot Desmond did not do Martin O’Neill a ‘favour’ by picking the phone up to him twice last year.

O’Neill wasn’t exactly champing at the bit to get back into football management at 73 years of age.

He returned to Celtic as a favour to Dermot Desmond.

What he did during both of his stints at the club last season was nothing short of miraculous.

It will go down as one of the most historic double wins in Celtic’s old and storied history.

I have no qualms in saying that O’Neill elevated himself to legendary status at Celtic after his heroics last season.

For his achievements, Dermot Desmond should be thanking him profusely, and supplying him with everything he needs to make this Celtic team the best that it can be.

No questions asked.

This is what any normal, decent human being would do.

But it’s crystal clear that Dermot Desmond doesn’t fall into the normal, decent human being category.

Because if he did, we wouldn’t be hearing the kind of language we’re hearing from Martin O’Neill of late.

Martin O’Neill continually speaks as if it is he who owes Dermot Desmond something.

The fact that Desmond has never moved publicly to show O’Neill his support when last season’s achievements warranted it more than ever tells us that he’ll never change.

According to reports, following Martin O’Neill’s dramatic final-weekend title win in his interim return, Desmond apparently privately phoned him to express his ‘significant’ gratitude.

Wow, that was nice.

It’s a pity his ‘significant’ gratitude doesn’t extend to fully supporting him in the monumental rebuild of the footballing operation this summer, isn’t it?

Because based on current evidence, that isn’t happening, is it?

However, I would have to say that O’Neill’s comments on Dermot Desmond during this week are a major cause for concern.

He had this to say in the aftermath of Celtic’s 4-1 capitulation to Sporting Lisbon in the Algarve, when he was questioned as to whether he had looked for any transfer guarantees from Dermot Desmond and the club hierarchy:

No, I didn’t. I didn’t put anything at all. I just hope that we can do some business at the end of it all. But no, I didn’t put any assurances.

I can’t turn around and say, ‘By the way, you need to get me 12 players, and if you only get 10, then you’ve broken the trust or something.’ No, not necessarily.

Maybe it’s the fact that I know the owner of the football club for some time and I genuinely believe that he will come up and help when trying to get things over the line, let me put it that way.

All of those comments raised serious alarm bells with me.

I just hope we can do some business at the end of it all?

This should not be a situation involving hope, this should be a situation involving guarantees.

Martin O’Neill had every right to look for guarantees after what he delivered.

Why he would feel he didn’t baffles me.

When he speaks about them breaking his trust?

Well, if you ask me, they’ve well and truly broken it by wasting nearly 8 weeks of this transfer window and landing one solitary signing.

Trust went out the window quite some time ago.

But the final sentence in that segment?

Maybe it’s the fact that I know the owner of the football club for some time and I genuinely believe that he will come up and help when trying to get things over the line, let me put it that way.

This one actually really angered me, and I honestly thought Martin O’Neill was made of sterner stuff than what that comment implies.

For starters, his perception of Dermot Desmond as the owner of the football club is ignorant in the extreme.

Dermot Desmond is the principal shareholder at Glasgow Celtic.

He does NOT own this football club!

He may act like he does, and clearly Martin O’Neill has fallen for that act, but there is another 66% of shareholders out there who also have a stake in this club.

As for O’Neill’s genuine belief that he will come up and help when trying to get things over the line?

Why not ask Brendan Rodgers about the extent of Desmond’s help in the transfer window, not to mind a major rebuild?

Having said that, in light of what Martin O’Neill achieved last season, helping him in the transfer window is the least Desmond should do.

It is naive in the extreme from O’Neill not to have demanded this.

He had more than enough leverage to do so.

Especially when we consider the lack of support he was given in last January’s transfer window.

Not a penny was spent.

In fact spending money on players has become an absolute rarity at Celtic in the last year or so.

Hence the reason may of us were genuinely surprised at the fact we spent in the region of £6 million on Camilo Duran.

In addition to that, O’Neill trying to give us reassurances that Michael Nicholson is ‘busting a gut’ in the background in his attempts to land transfers shows naivety that is off the scale.

Michael Nicholson is the very reason we are 8 weeks into the summer window having landed the sum total of one signing.

That should be a major cause for concern for the Celtic manager.

There’s also something else you need to bear in mind here.

O’Neill attended the Association of Irish Celtic Supporters Clubs AGM recently.

When Michael Nicholson was questioned on recruitment or a lack thereof at Celtic, this was the answer that was given in the minutes published afterwards:

Michael Nicholson took the question and advised of the difficulty in dealing with agents, competing with the Premier League and even The Championship.

He advised that the easy signings are the players that are out of contract and these are being worked on immediately.

Utter bullshit.

Nicholson’s answer should have caused palpitations for O’Neill, but for some reason it didn’t.

So much so, that he trotted out something similar in his recent comments.

Nicholson would do well to be honest, and admit that it is he who is the one that has difficulty with anything to do with transfer negotiations.

The problem isn’t agents, and it isn’t competing with the Premier League or the Championship.

It is Michael Nicholson.

Because his transfer record absolutely stinks.

So who else could it be?

Not exactly £17k per week well spent either, is it?

As for the line that the easy signings are the players who are out of contract and these are being worked on immediately?

For starters, you can’t call them signings if they were already in the building.

That’s f***ing gaslighting, nothing else.

Then the fact that he stated they are being worked on immediately is complete and utter bullshit.

8 f***ing weeks and counting does not translate into immediately.

The fact that people, including the manager, sat there and accepted this bollocks as a legitimate explanation defies belief!

I know if I was there what I would have stood up and said.

“Are you for f***ing real, Mike? Seriously, what do you take us for?”

And we’re supposed to trust this process?

You’ll have to forgive me if I’m a tad skeptical on this one, folks.

And that’s putting it mildly.

Due to the fact that Martin O’Neill is trusting this bullshit, he runs the risk of torching his reputation at Celtic.

Because if he is not supplied with the players he needs to compete in the upcoming season, then he is complicit in this utter fiasco.

The Champions League is now gone, let’s just accept that.

It’s too late to expect us to qualify now, too much time has been wasted.

We’re completely ill-prepared for that venture.

And this was our last chance to have a one-qualifier route to the League phase.

It is utter idiocy that we have not prepared for it.

The best we can hope for is to be competitive domestically.

But you know what the ultimate humiliation in all of this would be?

If Wouter Vrancken managed to qualify Hearts for the tournament, and we didn’t?

They have a decent chance of beating Sturm Graz in the second round qualifier.

Because at least Hearts will be prepared for their qualification route.

Which is more than I can say for us.

Martin O’Neill is once again accepting of this.

And it is his complete apathy in all of this that really scares me.

Does he even care about his reputation?

Or is he really so naive that he is willing to ‘trust the process’ at Celtic?

As we go deeper into this fiasco, his jovial, jocular old man act isn’t going to cut it.

We need to see flashes of Martin O’Neill MK 1.

Because he sure as hell would not have tolerated this utter mediocrity.

Which begs the question, why is he willing to accept it now?

Only he can answer that.

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