Martin O’Neill explains why he is in London the day after Celtic beat Rangers at Hampden

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Martin O’Neill has explained why he is in London less than 24 hours after Celtic beat Rangers in the Premier Sports Cup.

The Celtic manager enjoyed watching the Bhoys beat Rangers in a thrilling 3-1 cup win at Hampden to book his place in the final against St Mirren on the 14th of December.

O’Neill would have been forgiven for celebrating with the players and nursing a sore head after he took Celtic one step closer to a possible domestic treble.

But instead, the interim Celtic boss is in London this morning and here, O’Neill explains why.

• READ MORE: Martin O’Neill explains why he is in London the day after Celtic beat Rangers at Hampden

The Europa League reason interim Celtic boss Martin O’Neill is in London

When asked if he will be involved in the decision on a new manager, O’Neill told talkSPORT, “Absolutely not. I’ve never been in a selection programme ever with Dermot Desmond at Celtic.

“Never, never one. And I’m quite sure if he’d ever asked me in those 20 years, I probably would have sent them in a totally different and very worrying direction. So there we go.

“They’ve had great success, so that will continue in that sense, but me, I will have nothing at all to do with the new manager coming in.”

So why is O’Neill in London less than 24 hours after beating Rangers in the Premier Sports Cup? O’Neill has a simple Europa League reason for that.

The interim Celtic boss continued, “I was in such a haste to get up there to Scotland last Tuesday, but I have not got my passport, so I have to come down and bring my passport up, otherwise I do not get into Denmark.”

What Martin O’Neill said about taking the Celtic job permanently after Rangers win

O’Neill has always stated that he will be at Celtic temporarily as the club look for their replacement for Brendan Rodgers.

The interim Celtic boss has always maintained he won’t be in Glasgow long-term, and after beating Rangers the Northern Irishman was resolute in that opinion.

O’Neill stated, “On a serious note, I would imagine there’s a fortnight break now, next week, at the end of the next week, and I actually think the club would probably be making inroads into getting someone in.”