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SPL June 2011
Scottish Premier League News June 2011: Celtic Win Scottish Cup As Rangers Finish As SPL Champions
Ali Morrello
Celtic
Neil Lennon finished the season by putting one trophy in the cabinet, but even if it was not the one he really wanted, the Hoops boss has guaranteed that he will begin next season with the full backing of the Celtic support.
After a campaign in which he has received death threats, attacked the SFA, had a verbal spat with his opposite numbers, Walter Smith and Ally McCoist at Rangers and been assaulted on the touchline by a Hearts fan, Lennon rounded the season off with a comfortable 3-0 win in the Scottish Cup final over Motherwell.
The league was lost by a solitary point. The Parkhead side were left to rue the obviously wounding 3-2 defeat to Inverness in the final weeks of the campaign, although a poor run over the festive period was also a definitive factor in their second-placed finish.
Despite failing to bring home the SPL trophy, Lennon has brought back the "thunder" which he so eloquently promised when he was handed the Celtic managerial job on a permanent basis last July.
On the final day of the SPL season, despite seeing the title go to Ibrox, the Parkhead fans stayed behind at the final whistle to serenade Lennon with a rousing rendition of 'You'll Never Walk Alone'. For his part, the manager thanked them for their support.
"It's been a great source of comfort and inspiration, really; not just to me but to the rest of the backroom staff, the board and certainly the players," he said. "For me, this isn't the end -- this is just the beginning."
That statement brought the house down. Major shareholder Dermot Desmond has already stated that he wishes Lennon to stay on at the club for "a very long time".
Contract negotiations with the manager are due to begin, although Lennon himself has insisted that he will not allow himself to think about being at Celtic long-term.
Lennon is currently on a six-month rolling contract and has made no secret of his wish for a longer agreement, but after defeating Motherwell in the cup final he also hinted that he will not simply sign whatever is put in front of him by the club without making clear his own terms and conditions.
"I don't do ‘long term'," said Lennon. "I'm just hoping to be the manager next year. I'm hoping to sit down with maybe Peter [Lawwell] and Dermot and maybe the chairman as well and see what they want and what they want to offer, and hopefully they'll hear what I want to say and hopefully we'll reach an agreement on it.
"I don't really think long term in football because there are no guarantees. We've made really good progress this year and I think we'll maybe come back better next year. But there's no point me saying that without being able to back it up. I don't think we've done a lot wrong this season in terms of the way we've been consistently playing, so we just have to come back a little bit better and we won't go far wrong. The club knows the areas we need to strengthen. Whether we're able to do that is another thing."
When asked if he wanted the club to listen to his claim for an improved contract in terms of duration and salary, he said: "I didn't say that. We'll sit down and negotiate that but whether I get an improved contract or not remains to be seen."
The mutual respect between Lennon and Desmond cannot be questioned. Having secured the first silverware of his managerial career, Lennon praised the Irish businessman for the fresh perspective and advice he had offered throughout his first campaign.
"Dermot has been a great source of encouragement and a great source of advice," said Lennon. "He sees things a little bit differently, as these people do because they have been successful in their own walks of life. It's great to hear things from another angle. He's a leader in business and he passes down little nuggets which make me think differently about things.
"I'm very happy, very pleased, to hear what he said about me. He's a great supporter of the club. I think sometimes that gets lost. He's on the phone to me regularly. Wherever he is in the world, he gets updated all the time on the team."
Lennon said that over the summer he intended to trim the size of his first-team squad and also add "three or four quality players". One priority will be to resolve the situation regarding a goalkeeper.
Being able to sign Fraser Forster on a permanent contract would be his preference but Alan Pardew, the Newcastle United manager, has said he wants him back now that his season-long loan at Celtic is over.
Lennon does not want to have a keeper on loan again, and will either try to sign Forster on a full deal or look elsewhere, with Shay Given strongly linked to the club.
Rangers
Rangers manager Walter Smith bowed out of his the Ibrox hot seat after delivering a third successive title, but the veteran boss did not go quietly.
After seeing the back of a shameful season in Scotland, Smith laid the blame for a catalogue of ugly, fractious incidents at the foot of Celtic. It's believed that Smith would have made the same remarks whether or not he had won the SPL, but the fact Rangers were successful allowed him to make them without being tagged a sore loser.
Smith declared himself relieved to be leaving the country after a campaign that has seen Rangers forced to deal with problems of their own making - including financial constrictions imposed after a period of profligacy - and created by those supporters who have persisted obstinately with the singing of proscribed songs and who have now triggered sanctions from Uefa.
"After the season we have had here I am ready to get out of here - out of Scotland. It has been a fraught year for everybody. I don't think there has been any doubt about that," said Smith.
"It seems as though I've spent a season answering questions about everything except football. That has made it - when we win the League Cup and then the league - great that we've shown a winning mentality.
"When it gets to this stage, it seems to me that all of the focus has been deflected from what it should have been on, which is football players, what they do, who wins, who loses. We've not been talking about that this season.
"The season got off to a bad start, in that respect, when Celtic put up a challenge to referees and to everybody else. That got the season off to a bad start and it went downhill after that.
"From my own point of view, I hope everybody would realise that people who work in Scottish football - referees included - are always under terrific scrutiny. It was an unfair circumstance they were placed in this season and I just hope that now everybody gets on with it.
"And I hope Celtic realise that, if their team is good enough, they will win. If they're not good enough, they'll not win - and they can't look at anybody else, whether it's referees or any other influence.
"I don't say that in a smug way. I just felt that it set the tone for what it has been a poor season for our country, in terms of publicity overall."
Madjid Bougherra, Rangers' Algerian international defender, used the club's official website to have a pop at Celtic when he said of the Ibrox side's 54th league title - sealed with Sunday's 5-1 win over Kilmarnock at Rugby Park: "It is fantastic as everyone knew our situation. We didn't have a big squad and we had many games to play, including in the Champions League and Europa League.
"Even so, we never complained and got on with our jobs. We did our best and in the end we were the champions.
"You know, I remember hearing a Celtic player - I think it was Kris Commons - saying they were younger, faster and better than us. I can tell him now that we are maybe older and slower but we are the champions once again."
As to his own record at Ibrox, Smith once again declined to designate this latest title success as one that differs in kind from the others he has supervised - nine full campaigns in total plus the closing games of the 1990-91 season, when he succeeded Graeme Souness as Ibrox manager.
"I've said before, if you have been involved in teams that have won championships, I don't think you can pick and choose which one is better than another one," Smith said.
"This season there has been a lot going on surrounding the club, which has made it a nice one but you just can't separate them.
"I look at a lot of my pals who have been in football for a long time, and don't get a chance to win one championship, never mind a few, so it would be wrong of me to select one of mine as the best.
"I've been involved in quite a few and I'd put them all on a par."
Meanwhile, Rangers' are new under the stewardship of businessman Craig Whyte who has assumed financial control of the club. And the new man wasted no time in making his presence felt.
Whtye almost immediately sacked chairman Alastair Johnstone and fellow director Paul Murray when they refused to resign from their positions. Johnston later, via the media, challenged Whyte to "walk the walk and not just talk the talk".
The owner has responded by reminding the skeptics that he has already wiped out the club's debt to Lloyds Banking Group and has held initial discussions with new manager Ally McCoist about the acquisition of new signings ahead of next season. "I have been disappointed by some comments regarding the takeover made by former board members who are clearly reluctant to embrace change," said Whyte.
"I believe most Rangers supporters understand that, as a result of the takeover, the club's debt to the Lloyds Banking Group has been cleared and I have repeatedly stated to the board my intentions to invest in the team. I have had discussions with Ally McCoist regarding his ambition to secure players already playing for the club and also to bring new faces to the squad. These discussions will resume when Ally returns to Ibrox this week."
These comments followed the most explosive day of Whyte's short time in charge. Not only were Johnston and Murray relieved of their positions but chief executive Martin Bain and finance director Donald McIntyre were suspended, pending an internal investigation.
New appointments are set to be made imminently in order to bolster the board as Whyte continues to sever links with the previous regime, while also dispensing with dissenting voices.
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