The way Celtic handled Iheanacho and Saracchi was both bad business – and bad PR – and no amount spin from Gannon and the Record will change that

Michael Gannon is desperately trying to paint Celtic’s handling of Marcelo Saracchi and Kelechi Iheanacho as good business, but bad PR.

Alright, let’s just go along with Gannon’s theory and say that it was bad PR.

If this was the case, then he’s a serious victim of said bad PR.

Or is he?

Somebody inside Celtic told him that the club were being held to ransom by Iheanacho and his supposed £50k wage demands.

Gannon did, after all, state that was what he was demanding.

Surely he didn’t just make that figure up himself?

Pull it out of thin air, as it were.

So by definition, Gannon himself is collateral in Celtic’s shit PR campaign to smear Kelechi Iheanacho and his agent as ruthless, greedy individuals, holding poor Michael Nicholson over the barrel of a gun.

We all know that this is isn’t the case.

Now, let’s take the poor PR bollocks from Gannon out of the equation, and look at what he claims is supposedly ‘good business’ from Celtic in his article.

Here’s what’s called good business.

And it’s very, very simple.

Celtic had the option to trigger another year on Kelechi Iheanacho’s deal.

He was earning £35,000 per week on that deal.

Exercise the option, and we do not even get to this juncture.

Celtic clearly didn’t want to continue paying this amount to Iheanacho, hence the reason they allowed the deal to expire, and didn’t exercise the option for the extension.

Good business, or bad business?

Well, I’ll let you be the judge of that.

Remember, you must always follow the money at Celtic.

Every pound is a prisoner for the ‘double billionaire’.

That is how you become a ‘double billionaire’, after all.

By being ruthless.

But sometimes, that kind of ruthlessness doesn’t quite cut it in the footballing world.

And we all know Desmond and his cabal of minions aren’t football men.

The Celtic board were confident Iheanacho wouldn’t want to leave, and he’d come looking to do a new deal.

Then they could lowball him, effectively offering less than half of what he was earning prior to that, in a take it or leave it deal.

They did the same to Shaun Maloney and Mark Fotheringham, except it didn’t quite pull off for them in that instance.

This is the way they reward success.

Thanks for delivering said success, but now we want to do it for way less than you did it before.

That IS not good business.

Whether you like it or not, without Kelechi Iheanacho’s goals in the latter end of last season, Celtic do not win the title.

It’s that simple.

His fitness levels are irrelevant, they are the facts, we don’t win the title without him.

Normally, you get rewarded for such achievements.

Not at Celtic.

NOT. GOOD. BUSINESS.

Therefore, everything that followed thereafter was not good business, nor was it good PR.

Despite what Michael Gannon says.

If Celtic had just done the decent thing and exercised his option immediately, Iheanacho would now have an entire pre-season under his belt.

He would probably be in a much fitter state than he was throughout last season.

That’s called good business.

Instead, he’s gone to Bursaspor.

Celtic look like the cheapskates they are, the PR campaign to smear him after his move went down like a flaming wreck, and the SMSM are complicit in facilitating all of that.

Gannon’s article today is nothing but an exercise in trying to save his own ass after Celtic fed him a load of shite.

What’s worse is in doing so, he attempts to paint the people in our boardroom as astute business men.

And he still tries to convince us that Kelechi Iheanacho and Marcelo Saracchi were just bad players that Celtic didn’t want.

Sure Saracchi was injured for half the season, what would Celtic want him for?

And Kelechi Iheanacho was just ‘sauntering through training, looking like he was just back from a fortnight’s all inclusive after about half an hour’.

He could’ve been as f***ing portly as the legendary Newcastle and Coventry striker, Micky Quinn, who still scored 235 goals in his career.

But without Iheanacho’s goals, we are not Champions.

Without Saracchi’s contribution in the game against Hearts, we are not Champions either.

That matters.

It might not matter to the absent meddling golfer, or Silent Mike and the board cronies, or even Michael Gannon.

But it matters to us.

So no Michael Gannon, Celtic fans aren’t furious at the Celtic board because of a bad PR gaff, get that much straight.

We’re furious because of the way they treat the people who contributed heavily to our success last season.

We’re furious at how much they embarrassed our club with the bullshit they fed you afterwards.

And we’re furious they couldn’t tie up two simple deals for players who deserved to play a part in next season’s adventure.

Because both of those players deserved better than the way they were treated.

We see that through the prism of a fanbase, not through the prism of a boardroom under the thumb of a ruthless billionaire.

Who views everything as a number, and how much more he can make from that number.

It’s one of the main reasons we’ll never see eye to eye with him.

Or the board.

And it’s unlikely we ever will.

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