Martin O’Neill’s mysterious trip to London after beating Rangers

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The Celtic Star

·04 de novembro de 2025

Martin O’Neill’s mysterious trip to London after beating Rangers

It was a funny moment when Martin O’Neill told Jim Whyte on talkSport yesterday why he was back in London the day after emerging from the Premier Sports Cup semi-final as the winner…

Martin O’Neill. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo AJ (The Celtic Star)

“What are you doing back in London?” Jim White asked the interim Celtic manager on talkSPORT yesterday morning, the day after Martin O’Neill secured Celtic’s place in next month’s Premier Sports Cup final against St Mirren with a 3-1 victory over theRangers. “You’ve got a game in Denmark on Thursday.”

Vídeos OneFootball

“Remarkable,” O’Neill replied. “I was in such haste to get up there to Scotland last Tuesday, that I had not got my passport. So I had to come down and bring my passport up, otherwise I do not get into Denmark.”

Martin O’Neill. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

A funny moment, but one that shows Celtic are currently flying by the seat of their pants following the events of the last few months which all came to a head last Monday evening, thus the frantic dash to Glasgow last Tuesday morning for the legendary Celtic manager.

Of course that may have been a cover story and Martin may well have been in London for another reason, perhaps to meet up with Dermot Desmond, who you would imagine – putting aside the rights and wrongs of this if that is the case – is leading the search for Celtic’s next manager following on from Brendan Rodgers.

With other candidates in the mix, some keener than others it has to be noted, Dermot would not want any knowledge of O’Neill being in London to meet him getting out. If there was no way he was going to be able to persuade O’Neill to stay on then the last thing he’d want is for names on his shortlist to know that they weren’t first choice after all.

Just a thought.

Shaun Maloney and Martin O’Neill. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

The timeline makes sense too. Get the next two games out of the way, hopefully making it four wins from four, hit the international break which will allow Celtic to take a breath and ahead of the AGM – which is set to be lively to say the least – announce Martin O’Neill and Shaun Maloney will remain in place to the end of the season.

Alfred Dunhill Links Championship 2024 Dermot Desmond on the 18th tee during the final round of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship 2024 on the Old Course at St. Andrews Golf CLub, Fife, . 06/10/2024. Picture Fran Caffrey / Golffile.ie

Quite a few ifs, buts and maybes in that but it’s more plausible that Martin having to fly down to London to collect his passport when Celtic could have sorted than in so many different ways that wouldn’t involve Martin have to spend his day in airports and flying to and from Glasgow.

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Celtic in the Eighties and Willie Fernie – Putting on the Style both by David Potter. Photo The Celtic Star

Danny McGrain signing copies of Celtic in the Eighties by David Potter. Photo: Celtic Star Books