Former Celtic hero JACKIE McNamara told Go Radio he believes his former boss Martin O’Neill could sort this mess out at Celtic and would have the players not shipping goals from set pieces.
Jackie worked under the Irishman and knew everyone was given man marking responsibilities and would take the heat if their man scored against the Hoops.
Speaking to GoRadio, asked if Martin O’Neill could come in again and make Celtic a winning team, he said:
“I think Martin would, to be honest with you. They wouldn’t be losing many goals from set pieces anyway.
“I think he would have them set up there and they would be under no illusions as to whose responsibility it was to be marking their man.
“I think that goes a long way: the basics, the fundamentals.
“You can be dominating the game, have all the possession and all the chances, but if you don’t defend your box properly you’re not going to win.”
Asked if the current crop of players or just the new generation of stars could handle O’Neill’s methods, Jack wasn’t so sure:
“That’s a great point, I hear a lot of people talking just now about coaching players and it’s a different era.
“We never got told where to go, where to stand, where to pass the ball to.
“Just now you get the impression that it’s an excuse, that there’s a blame culture there because the manager never told them they should pass it there or ‘we don’t work on tactics’.
“You’re brought up knowing football and learning football every day.
“I guess at the top, the top managers out there, it’s the fine margins because they’re so elite.
“But I think at this level the basics, the fundamentals, they don’t do.
“That’s nothing to do with tactics, just marking someone and knowing that’s your job defensively.
“It’s a blame culture and the blame falls with the manager.
“If someone like Martin comes in right now, as you say the snowflake generation might not be able to handle that.”
The game has moved on since the remedial instructions of go out there and make things happen. Many of the players at the club who worked under Rodgers knew exactly what they needed to do in most scenarios to make things happen.
Some players want to be well drilled and not have the sort of autonomy on the field Neil Lennon have his players. As we’ve witnessed, if there’s no proper plan in place, things can go badly wrong.
