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Speaking on the Daily Record podcast, the former Celtic striker, who does not want Martin O’Neill to stay on much longer as he fears that his legacy at the club could end up being tarnished. It has to be said there are very few signs of that happening so far and Martin himself, when asked about Sutton’s opinion on the matter, at his media conference last Friday ahead of the game against Kilmarnock, dismissed the concern as irrelevant, pointing to perhaps only Jock Stein having achieved a proper legacy as Celtic manager. The two main contenders at the moment appear to be Kjetil Knutsen and Wilfried Nancy with Martin O’Neill probably still in Dermot Desmond’s thoughts perhaps until the end of the season if all parties could agree on that. On the two ‘candidates’ Sutton describes the Norwegian as ‘interesting’ but points out that whoever gets the job is going to have their work cut out. “It’s interesting about Knutsen, because we would probably all look at his track record and think that Celtic would be better off going for him. But it’s like anything. When Ange Postecoglou came in, he took a lot of flak, didn’t he, because nobody had ever heard of him and dismissed his track record,” Sutton stated. “I don’t know how people would view Knutsen’s track record and what he’s achieved at Bodo/Glimt, but the fact that he’s gone deep in European competitions before certainly would bode well.” The former Celtic striker added: “If Wilfried Nancy is the choice, you’ve got to give him a chance and give him opportunity. You know my view on this – any manager taking over this current squad has their work cut out. They just do, because it’s about the level of player and standard of player which they’re taking over. “It’s going to be interesting to see, from now until January, there’s another couple of games in the Europa, how Celtic cope in that and the reaction from the fanbase. But I think now, the truth is that most Celtic fans are thinking, ‘blimey. If we can just win one thing this season, it has to be the league. Take the league, and we just have to forget about Europe. “Because as much as everyone wanted to see progression this year in Europe, it doesn’t really look like this strong enough to be competitive at all.” Sorting that goes much deeper than a managerial change, it’s structural and it’s all about how Celtic wants to see itself and be seen as a football club. Domestic dominance has been a given but even that is being threatened this season amid internal turmoil and supporter unrest. Sutton’s bottom line though, in winning the league is fine but there’s also a final just around the corner that Celtic should be heavy favourites to win. Martin O’Neill has set a ten points target, so we need six points from the remaining four matches. It’s perfectly achievable looking at the fixtures but equally when push comes to shove we usually come up short in European football. Martin with the assistance of Shaun Maloney has three consecutive domestic wins to their name, cutting Hearts lead by four points and knocking theRangers out of the Premier Sports Cup. That has surely got to be a factor because the interim management team’s direction of travel is clearly positive and hints at delivering more that the minimum Sutton has identified. Why not simply stick with that for now unless there is one outstanding candidate who would be able to hit the ground running? But even then he would have little or no knowledge or much say on any January transfers the club should be working on right at this moment.
