“I just wonder what the great Jock Stein would have thought of it,” Martin O’Neill | OneFootball

Martin O’Neill popped into the media room at Celtic Park after attending today’s extraordinary AGM when another Dermot Desmond tirade was unleashed, this time not on the club’s official website but at the shareholders meeting…

And it wasn’t delivered by the club’s principal shareholder directly, but instead by his son, Ross. Well, it was only fair as Peter Lawwell’s boy got a shot as Head of Recruitment, that time he spent £25m – the entire Jota money – on his Football manager team.

It was more of a chat from Martin than a meaningful pre-match media conference so there’s very little to report ahead of Celtic’s trip to Paisley tomorrow evening to take on St Mirren. Nothing on injuries, team news or anything like that. He did say he’d have to pick Kasper Schmeichel up off the floor after events at Hampden on Tuesday night, and mentioned that the timing of the AGM was hardly convenient for him given that the team were training this morning ahead of tomorrow’s match.

Celtic interim manager Martin O’Neill during the Premier League match between Celtic and Kilmarnock at Celtic Park on November 09, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Here’s everything that was said as Martin O’Neill chatted to the media at Celtic Park and hinted that the next permanent manager could be in place in the very near future, contradicting the Columbus Crew assessment that we reported on this morning regarding no DIRECT contact from Celtic. (Agents; they’ve all got them you know).

A day or so ago that would have been big news, now though its all about the Celtic family at war and where the club is going from here on what is a very dark day for anyone with Celtic in their hearts. Martin’s comments in his Celtic TV interview and also in this media conference has resulted in some criticism being directed at him. He looked rather shocked by it all, he certainly wasn’t expecting it and he was always going to be on the side of the club if push came to shove. His remarks on Jock Stein might not have been as accurate as he thinks though and while it was a different board look at the way they treated him when he left the club?

Martin O’Neill at Celtic Park on October 28, 2025 (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

The current lot did the same thing to Brendan Rodgers having taken the goals out of his team then sticking that video up about how Brendan’s team broke records last season for goals scored. They didn’t even notice the irony. And many of the supporters, so angry by Dermot’s boy’s out may reflect on the lack of support that their fellow ‘rebel’ Brendan Rodgers was given for taking them on himself. Makes you wonder what he thought when seeing that today? Probably glad to be well shot iof it…

Martin’s quotes continue on the next page…

Q: Martin, unprecedented scenes at the AGM, what do you make of it all?

Martin O’Neill: “Do you know what I thought? I thought it was a really sad, sad morning. A really sad morning. I’ve just done a little interview there. I mentioned, I just wonder what the great Jock Stein would have thought of it all, you know, who preached unity at the football club, said that a club not united would never be successful. And yeah, it was really sad. It’s as sad a morning as I’ve seen. I mean, I’ve been to a few of these AGMs before, and I suppose because we’d been doing well at the time, that it was nice. I’m not even sure I was ever asked a question at the time. But yeah, that was rather raucous.”

Peter Lawwell, former CEO of Celtic, is seen in attendance prior to the Premier Sports League Cup match between Celtic and Falkirk at Celtic Park on August 15, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Q: Peter Lawwell did warn the floor a couple of times that, you know, if the behaviour didn’t improve, then he’d be left with no option. Did he have no option?

Martin O’Neill:  “Well, it looked that way, really, because no one was being heard. And I think that there were an awful lot of people in the room who would have wanted to have asked questions, you know. And I think the board, listen, I’m not an apologist for the board. I’m here on an interim basis. And I am privileged to be here for a second time, as I was for the first time as well, too. But, you know, there were people who had wanted to have asked questions, and the board have said that they’ve made mistakes. And I think there’s only so many times that you can apologise, and then, you know, you have to get on with things again. So we’ll start again, and hopefully that will start when the new manager comes in. Just a united Celtic that will be far better equipped to compete and try and win again.”

Q: Do you think that’s possible after scenes like that?

Martin O’Neill: “Well, it shouldn’t be impossible. Really, it should not be impossible. I think that there’s got to be a coming together again from this. And the success at the Football Club over the last 20-odd years has been obviously there for all to see, I must admit. But, yeah, it wasn’t great. In fact, it was quite poor. But at the end of it all, yeah, I feel as if that there’s an obvious disconnect at this minute, but that surely can be rectified.”

Q: That disconnect obviously, Martin, was evident way before you came back for the second time. Did you think with your arrival perhaps could have forged some sort of connect again?

Martin O’Neill: “Well, I think, well, that would be asking a lot of…”

Q: Just in terms of what you mean to the supporters?

Martin O’Neill: “Well, naturally it’s nice, and I’ve had a really decent reception, which I am pleased about, and that could end very, very quickly. You know, you have to win football matches in this to keep things going. I look around. I’ve gone to Lennoxtown, and I remember travelling to Lennoxtown in 2005, just before I left, where they were thinking about moving to a new ground. It was just the big castle-y sort of thing up there, and just a set of fields. And I go up there now, and it’s incredible. It’s incredible. And the players, they have everything, you know. It’s there. The pitches are immaculate. They are so well looked after, so well looked after now. So there have been changes. That’s obviously cost a lot of money.

“We trained at Barrowfield way back 20-odd years ago, and sometimes when they were rolling out the tarpaulin, their tarpaulin would go to about minus four, but if it was minus seven, then we had a frozen pitch. You know what? It didn’t matter. I never heard Henrik Larsson or Johann Mialby or anybody ever complaining about it. Neil Lennon might have done once or twice, but overall, yeah. So things have improved immensely. I get back to the point about, you asked me a question with my interim period, you know, fusing things together. I don’t think that was ever going to happen, but what you have to do, in the mean, is that you’ve got to now realise that that has happened. Mistakes have been made, and they can be rectified, and hopefully rectified quickly.

Martin’s quotes continue on the next page…

Q: Were you due to say a few words today Martin?

Martin O’Neill: “If I’d got an opportunity, I would probably be saying what I’m saying here. So I think that, yeah, I wish now I had said a few words. Listen, I don’t think, since my words don’t go down all that well in my own household, so I don’t think it would make really much difference, you know. I’ve got three people in my household who never listen to a word I say. But if given the opportunity, which might have occurred in the latter part of the AGM, yes, I would have said something.”

Q: When Ross Desmond spoke, it seemed to tip it for some shareholders on the floor, he was defending the board, he was defending his father, was he right to say what he said, and do you agree with what he said?

Martin O’Neill: “He has every right to say what he said, absolutely. And again, this is the point… I got this job 25 years ago because of one man, really. And he brought me in when he had bigger names to choose from, you know, people who had better CVs, bigger CVs, that type of stuff.  And I come in from that viewpoint, and I’ve had, you know, I must admit for the next couple of years, I’ve had the time of my life, which was fantastic.

“And he brought me back here again. He did not say to me, your job is to quell the discontent. That wasn’t it. It was to try and just hold the fort until they get, as he said, a proper manager in, although I wasn’t really convinced about that one! I have the utmost regard for him at the end of it all, and I think that what he has done at the football club, and the money that he has put in himself, sometimes those things are forgotten.”

Peter Lawwell, Michael Nicholson and Chris McKay applaud during the Scottish Premiership match between Celtic and Livingston at Celtic Park on August 23, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Q: When you’ve spoken to Peter Lawwell, when you’ve spoken to Michael Nicholson, what was their overall mood after it, could they believe what had happened?

Martin O’Neill: “Well, we had a little cup of tea in the boardroom afterwards, and yeah, I think there was just probably, I think they were expecting a tough time, but I think there maybe, I think there was a bit of shock as well around the room.”

Q: So they didn’t see anything like that coming, just expecting some sort of hard questions, but not that?

Martin O’Neill: “I got that impression, yeah, that’s right, and I think the impression would have been to at least have the opportunity for shareholders to ask some questions about the board and about where the football club is going on from here. So maybe try and learn from the past, if the past is recent then that’s, we’ve got to try and learn from it.

Martin’s quotes continue on the next page…

Q: Martin, just going to your position now, are you surprised to be here again for another press conference?

Martin O’Neill: “Well, the only one thing I would definitely guarantee, I’ll not be around for the next AGM, that is a certainty, which actually may be rearranged for next week again, so I will definitely not be around for that. And I may not even be around for that, around, around!  This young man’s having a laugh, you know, it’s all right, very well. I wish I was your age again, young man. Nothing great about getting old, nothing great about it at all.

“Getting back to your point. I’m still here,, I’m probably a bit surprised that I am, I thought maybe something might have got sorted out in the international break, I think that there’s definitely progress being made in that field. Yeah, so, bad news, you know, I will not be around much longer! I don’t think it’ll be a surprise to me if they announce something about midnight tonight, you know, so I’m going to be there for the game tomorrow night.”

Celtic interim manager Martin O’Neill during the Premier League match between Celtic and Kilmarnock at Celtic Park on November 09, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Q: Have you managed to focus on the game tomorrow night, Martin, because obviously when the international break started, as you said, you thought maybe something might have changed?

Martin O’Neill: “Oh yeah, yeah, I just put my focus on it, on working and the understanding that I’m here until I’m told not to be, and yeah, but I’m actually still surprised, I must admit, but yeah, I’ll just focus on that.”

Q: What do you expect tomorrow night?

Martin O’Neill:  “The very obvious, a really tough game, really tough game. I went to watch them against Hibs, and although they lost the game, there were some decisions that VAR… can anybody explain the VAR up here?”

Q: How long have you got?

Martin O’Neill: “Well, it depends which line you look at, doesn’t it really? That’s the job I want, it’s the job I want, just to be able to draw some crocked lines in some team I don’t want to win, and so, yeah, it’d be brilliant, I’d love it. Please, would you put me forward for that?

Q: Have you been given a definitive as to how long you will be in?

Martin O’Neill:  “No, I think that things should hot up in the next year and a half. I’m kidding, that’s just a rubbish joke.

Martin’s quotes continue on the next page…

Q: Will tomorrow be your last game?

Martin O’Neill:  “No, it could well be, and if we lost the game, and this is the point, not only am I going game by game in that sense, and a new manager coming in, but obviously, you know, you can outstay your welcome here as well too, you lose the games, and people will want to try and make a change pretty quickly then after that, which I understand, because we’re in the results business, we have to try and win.”

Kieran Tierney celebrates after scoring for Scotland against Denmark to take Scotland to the World Cup Finals! Photo – Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Q: On a different subject, how pleased were you for Kieran Tierney?

Martin O’Neill: “Do you know what, much as I loved my time in Scotland, and I did do, I can’t always say I was cheering the national side on all the time, I thought it was brilliant. I thought the victory, we went to the game, and I thought it was great, and I really, I must admit, well of course I was surrounded by Scots people anyway, with Shaun Maloney, Mark Fotheringham, and one of our really good scouts, but it was great, really great, and the manner in which they won, you couldn’t have foreseen that. It was fantastic, absolutely fantastic, so well done, and well done the manager, who is now the most successful Scottish manager, yeah?

“It’s really great, and for Kieran, I couldn’t be more pleased, couldn’t be more pleased really, but the goal, I was right behind it, right behind it, the minute it left his foot, I thought, this is heading in, and much as the fourth goal was obviously a great goal, three great goals for you, including McTominay’s, the fourth goal might not have happened if Kieran hadn’t scored, so brilliant, absolutely brilliant, yeah. So we have to now pick up Kasper Schmeichel from off the floor now, so that might be more difficult than you think, but we’ll see how he is.

“I haven’t had a chance today, because we’re training this morning, so what a time to organise an AGM, ridiculous, ridiculous, ridiculous, if I’d known it was going to last only four minutes, I honestly, yeah, I could have sent a substitute instead, you know?”

Q: How do you think Celtic the club and Celtic the supporters sort this situation out?

Martin O’Neill: “It will get sorted, how will it get it sorted? Right, okay, well I’m not a soothsayer, and you might be right, it might go on for longer than you think, but at the end of it all, I think that there’s, again I get back to the point, I think the board have said, you know, we make mistakes, we’re all doing it. I did say in the interview, I only make about £6,000 per day, so at the end of it all, you’ve got to, you’ve got to put something into the past and try and move forward, and that’s what Jock Stein would have said. As I say, he’s the greatest manager of the football club, and in any conversation he’d be the greatest manager of all time, and we are all followers after that, so that’s what Jock would be saying.”

Billy McNeill, Jock Stein and John Clark outside the doors of Celtic Park, as Billy is appointed Celtic manager and John his assistant, in summer 1978 Photo The Celtic Wiki

Q: What do you think he would have made of that?

Martin O’Neill: “He would have been massively disappointed with it, and he would have felt that it was really sad, at the football club, that he did so much to enrich.”

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