Five months on from Wilfried Nancy’s difficult spell at Celtic, one of the strangest moments from his time in Glasgow is still being discussed.
At the time, supporters were already frustrated by results, performances and the constant tactical changes inside the team. Celtic looked uncertain on the pitch. Players were moving into unfamiliar positions and confidence was draining quickly during the title race.
Then came the image.
Nancy changed his X profile picture to a diagram about “things you can control” and “things that matter”, with the overlap reading “what you should focus on”. Within hours it had gone viral across Scottish football.
Celtic fans were equally baffled. The timing could hardly have been worse. The team were dropping points and the manager suddenly appeared online posting motivational graphics while pressure was growing around him.
Nancy has now addressed the reaction during his first major interview since leaving Celtic.
He was speaking about how the image ended up on his account in the first place.
He said: (Training Ground Guru), “Honestly, I didn’t do it on purpose.
“And to be honest with you, my wife was not happy with me because she told me that, what did you do? I said I did nothing.
“She said, yeah, but you’re trending now because you put something on Twitter.
“I said, I didn’t do anything. I just did it, the image that I had, because it was the image of Columbus when I was in the dressing room of Columbus.
“And I just put the image that I have when people calls me on WhatsApp. I think that you saw it. This is the image that I have, that I like.
“Simple as that. And this is the image that I had before.
“So that’s why, you know, I deleted this picture to put a neutral picture that I use every day when people, instead of using an emoji, I use this.
“And it was a big drama. But again, I don’t like to waste time on that.
“People want you to do it. They did it. And I move forward and that’s it.
“But again, I didn’t want to do that. But this is part of the job that I have.
“And this is part also of the way we have to live with certain things like that.
“But again, I move forward.”
Nancy’s explanation probably makes more sense now than it did at the time.
The image clearly meant something to him personally from his Columbus days and was not intended as some public message aimed at supporters. But football rarely waits for context when results are poor.
At Celtic, everything becomes louder during a title race.
That profile picture became symbolic of a manager who never fully connected with the mood around the club. Fairly or unfairly, supporters saw it as another sign that things were drifting away from what Celtic usually demand in moments like that.
Even now, months later, it remains one of the defining images from Nancy’s short spell in Glasgow.
