When reflecting upon Celtic’s season, the 33 days of Wilfried Nancy nearly proved to be very, very costly for the club.
The only damaging part was Celtic missing out on the Treble; other than that, Martin O’Neill won the double, while Nancy’s reputation, after arriving from the MLS, took a massive hit.
What’s interesting is that over in the English Premier League, Bournemouth have appointed Marco Rose as their new manager – he succeeds Andoni Iraola.
Rose has previously been linked with the managerial gig at Celtic.
But with Bournemouth in the Europa League for next season, and facing nowhere near the pressure Celtic managers do, Rose has already done something that Nancy got horribly wrong, and that’s having a ‘two-hour meeting’ with Iraola before he takes over at the 10,000 seater stadium.
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Wilfried Nancy’s failure to acknowledge Martin O’Neill shown up by Marco Rose at Bournemouth
It has been reported by the BBC that Iraola’s final act at Bournemouth, and Rose’s first steps, was to hold a meeting talking about ‘players, tactics and the challenges he is about to face.’
Rewind back to Nancy moving to Glasgow, O’Neill mentioned that they briefly spoke for about ten minutes, and that’s it. That was criticised by many.
One of the issues of the Frenchman’s reign at Celtic was his lack of understanding of the situation.
Perhaps, if he had sat down longer with O’Neill, then he would be lifting a Treble; instead, his reputation is down the drain, in what were his first steps into European football.
The BBC also report that the meeting with the incoming and outgoing bosses at Bournemouth ‘impressed’ the powers that be at the club, and it was also ‘a sign of mutual respect between the pair.’
Nancy could have dealt with the Celtic chaos better
With or without Nancy, there is chaos at Celtic, fan protests, abject transfer windows, players underperforming and cancelled AGMs.
It was a declining team, and even with Celtic bringing back the Premiership title, many top names are still expected to leave this summer in a major clear-out at the club.
One of the best things O’Neill has done is manage the squad and the whole situation, including situations such as bringing back the Green Brigade.
Had Nancy sat down with O’Neill, he would have been more informed of these issues, and then probably dealt with on-and off-field matters a lot better.
Perhaps that would have allowed Nancy to fight his way through more positive results, rather than looking at his tactics board and serving up losses like a Rangers player during the post-split fixtures.
Either way, it will be interesting to see how Rose fares at Bournemouth and what Nancy’s next chapter will be.
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