Maloney Set for Surprise Return to Celtic

Shaun Maloney has made a surprise return to Celtic, replacing Darren O’Dea as the Club’s Professional Player Pathway Manager.

It was a job created for O’Dea in April 2024, very little was achieved with the former Celtic defender moving on to become assistant manager of Swansea with many suspecting that he wouldn’t be replaced.

David Friel of The Sun, a very reliable source of Celtic news broke the story just before 6pm on Tuesday with a predictable and misplaced social media reaction of a ‘jobs for the bhoys’ appointment. Celtic confirmed Maloney’s return this afternoon.

True Maloney had two stints as a player and also a season coaching at Celtic but he isn’t deserving of the jobs for the bhoys tag.

Since leaving his role of assisting Tommy McIntyre as B team manager Maloney has picked up priceless experience, working with Roberto Martinez and the Belgian national team from August 2018 to December 2021 as well as managing Hibs and Wigan.

At Easter Road he was sacked after just 19 matches which is almost par for the course if you’re not called David Gray, returning to Wigan he started League One with a 15 point deficit.

The Sun reported:

SHAUN MALONEY is poised to return to Celtic in a senior backroom role.

SunSport understands the former Hoops star is in line to succeed Darren O’Dea as the club’s professional player pathway manager.

The report adds:

His Latics reign ended three months ago but he is now set to return to Celtic in the professional player pathway manager role.

This will see Maloney be tasked with the job of guiding the Hoops’ brightest prospects, which includes responsibility for managing loans.

Celtic Football Club is delighted to announce that Shaun Maloney has been appointed as the club’s new Professional Player Pathway Manager, with the aim of developing the progression of players at the club.
More info below ⤵️#CelticFC🍀
— Celtic Football Club (@CelticFC) June 25, 2025

Maloney has great experience at the age of 42, a variety of coaching jobs on top of playing in the SPL, EPL and MLS. Along the way he picked up 47 full caps for Scotland.

With his personality, his drive for perfection management might not be his forte, a coaching role seems a far better fit but under his Celtic title he is basically the loans manager.

In theory it sounds an interesting post but the reality is that the Academy that Maloney came through isn’t developing players capable of having a full-time career in football never mind the Celtic aspiration of Champions League level players.

The table below makes for grim reading but is the reality of 15 years dependency on the failing St Ninian’s Schools project, the one that Lennon Miller rejected to join Motherwell.

Those u-18 players that lost 15 of 28 matches in the league last season are miles short of being capable of going out on loan next season to any SPFL club and progressing towards the Celtic first team. The ‘plastic fantastic’ of the Lowland League awaits them.

The blind faith in St Ninian’s has created a generation of players that are way short of what is required.

When Celtic joined the Lowland League in 2021 they turned to England, signing Bosun Lawal and Joey Dawson to get a competitive team on the park.

After four years playing at that level only Owen Moffat with a solitary appearance in December 2021 has started an SPFL match. Regardless of that Celtic have signed up for another season playing against Cumbernauld Colts, Caledonian Braves and the worst ever Cowdenbeath, Berwick Rangers and Albion Rovers sides.

Since Kieran Tierney’s breakthrough in season 2015/16 the Academy has run dry. In 2018 Aaron Hickey opted to develop his career with Hearts rather than Celtic, since then he has moved on to Serie A and the EPL, none of his former Celtic team-mates are still playing full time football.

Last season’s loan reports:

Tobi Oluwayemi, Adam Montgomery, Lenny Agbair and Josh Clarke were out on loan in the Championship last season, none of them are in the conversation to be catapulted into the first team squad.

Over in Austria, Matthew Anderson and Ben Summers picked up decent experience with Admira Wacker in the Second Division, for Matthews it was his second season at the same level while a loan season at Dunfermline never worked out for Summers. Both of them need to play in the SPFL Premiership in the season ahead to have any chance of cracking it at Celtic.

Who goes out on loan in season 25/26?

Some supporters seem to have high hopes for Francis Turley, Jude Bonnar and Sean McArdle- combined they played less than 90 minutes of first team action last season across four substitute appearances.

None of them will feature next season to any meaningful extent in the Celtic first team.

All of them, and any others need to go out on loan to the Scottish Championship in the season ahead, it will be sink or swim, if one of them returns first team ready it will be mission accomplished. Their progress can be assessed ahead of the January window, putting them all on loan to Queens Park in a co-operation agreement is bound to be part of the conversation.

Maloney’s role

Shaun is a coach not an administrator or a middle man for setting up loan deals. His strength is on the training ground, Mikey Johnston, Jack Aitchison and others loved working with him when he was with the B/Reserve team back in season 2017/18.

Having him back inside the club with his coaching and management experiences is clearly worthwhile but it can’t be denied that the role he is taking up isn’t the best match for his skills.

A more senior, hands on role is surely in the pipeline.

The big drawback

If Celtic get through their Play Off tie to reach the Champions League they will also qualify for the UEFA Youth League. In theory that sounds great but over the last three seasons putting up a decent showing at that level has denied players the chance to go out on loan. Playing against the best in Europe in midwek followed by Lowland League matches on plastic doesn’t help development.

Mitchell Frame impressed in his one first team appearance, off the bench at home to Feyenoord in December 2023. Last season he was back to playing in the UEFA Youth League when a season on loan at Motherwell or St Mirren would have been far better for his development.

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