Martin O'Neill 'shouldn't walk away' from Celtic, insists former Hoops striker

Martin O’Neill “shouldn’t walk away” from Celtic, insists former Hoops striker Andy Walker.

The 74-year-old has come under fire after the Champions League collapse against LASK was followed by two defeats to Rangers and a 3-1 Europa League loss at home to Ferencvaros.

Chief executive Michael Nicholson said in a statement on Tuesday that the club “will come together and support Martin and the players”.

“He shouldn’t walk away,” said Walker. “If there’s a change to be made, it’s up to the club to make the change.”

Walker lamented Celtic’s continued inability to be ready for Champions League play-offs, with six of their ten summer signings arriving after their costly defeat to LASK.

“I don’t think any Celtic supporter can understand why the club chooses not to be in the best possible place for Champions League qualification,” he said. “If that’s where they want to gain all the money, gain all the riches, why don’t you prepare in the best possible manner for Champions League qualifiers?”

Walker has been alarmed by some of the rhetoric from the dressing room in the wake of recent setbacks, with captain Callum McGregor saying last Thursday, “it’s a little bit broken”, and defender Cameron Carter-Vickers describing the team’s strategy on Sunday as “too random.”

Walker also felt Martin O’Neill’s joke following the 1-0 home defeat by Rangers that ‘I’ll be 110 in two years’ time so it might be time to wrap it up’ was not befitting of the moment, given the anger among the fanbase.

“I’ve listened to Liam Scales, Callum McGregor and Cameron Carter-Vickers over the last number of days, and no one seems to be on the same page, and I think that’s a bit of a concern,” Walker said on Go Radio.

“And one thing I would say about Martin O’Neill and his comments, I don’t really relate to the ‘I’ll be 110 in a couple of weeks’. I think the supporters want a bit of fighting talk. I liked his chat last week when they lost 3-0. He said it’ll be different at Parkhead. It wasn’t, but it’s the type of thing you want to hear.

“I worked under Billy McNeill and Tommy Burns. I saw the extraordinary effort and time they put into every game and every week, never mind talking about how draining it could be over the course of a season.

“So I just find it strange that the manager’s talking about being 110, and he’ll see if he can keep it going. After a defeat like that, supporters don’t want to hear it.

“They want to hear something a bit more positive. And they certainly want to hear at least that the players that have been put up for the media – I’m talking about McGregor, Carter Vickers, Scales – are all on the same page. It just didn’t seem that way.”