LEE NAYLOR says that former Celtic manager Neil Lennon didn’t have much of say in recruitment last season, as he slated the standard of signing brought in for the tilt at 10 in-a-row.
Naylor, who was a teammate of Lennon’s when Gordon Strachan was manager and then played under him when Tony Mowbray lost his job in 2010, is now a football agent, and has told of how he had approached Celtic with players last summer,
He says those advances were rebuffed by then head of football operations Nicky Hammond, and he was left with the impression that manager Lennon’s hands were tied when it came to the players being brought to the club.
“I’ve put a few in at the start of the season but there was no takers,” Naylor told the Celtic Huddle Podcast.
“There was a centre midfielder and striker. They would have fitted in well.
“Nicky Hammond was there at the time. I don’t know if Lenny had much say, to be honest.
“It depends on what a manager has to say [if I will approach them or not], if he’s ruling the roost. But I don’t think Lenny had much say, especially this season, and I think you could tell.”
Naylor is hoping that he will be able to do business with Celtic in the future, but he is surprised that he doesn’t yet know who to speak to at the club in regards to potential transfers, with the appointment of a new manager and a director of football still to be confirmed.
“I’ll have a few [players] lined up this summer,” Naylor said. “It will be interesting to see who takes the reins – I just need to know who to speak to!
“I’m pretty shocked nothing is in place at the moment. It’s a lot of work. You need to filter through all the rubbish to find the players who can come in and make a difference.
“You need to do your business quite early otherwise the best players will be gone.
“Celtic will probably need to get a few out first to refresh the funds. To assess who is leaving would be the first port of call and then it’s bringing in players early.
“You look at centre midfield, striker, maybe a winger first of all.
“There’s the goalkeeper, if you spent four or five million on a guy you are not that keen on, you need to get him out and bring in another one.
“But it’s clear the recruitment wasn’t good enough – it was way off.”
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