Where's Lawwell? Chairman goes AWOL from fan protests

With Celtic fans demonstrating against the club directors at Kilmarnock today Peter Lawwell decided to give the match a miss.

It is the second successive fixture that the club Chairman has missed, he failed to turn up at Ibrox two weeks ago for the Glasgow Derby and hasn’t been seen in public since enjoying a free lunch at the Champions League draw on August 28.

Lawwell rarely shies away from attention and publicity, if he can attach himself to any success at Celtic he has a network of messengers ready to insert him into any story.

Since the Champions League exit to Kairat Almaty there has been intense criticism of the way that Celtic operate, for the fifth successive time they had failed to navigate their way through Champions League qualifiers.

EUROPEAN FAILINGS

Lawwell was CEO as the hoops lost out to Maribor, Malmo, AEK Athens, Cluj and Ferencvaros with Dom McKay given Liam Shaw and Osaze Urhoghide as his handover two weeks before a Champions League exit to Midtjylland.

Since he was appointed CEO in October 2003 Celtic have won just one UEFA knock-out tie, against Barcelona six months later, with the club constantly under performing with Kairat the latest lower ranked opponents to expose Celtic’s failure to prepare for crucial fixtures.

A multitude of issues have come to the fore over the last few weeks, incredibly the club added to that with a ridiculous statement on the day that a senior figure in the club was highly critical in The Sun about Brendan Rodgers.

Ahead of those two events the Green Brigade had taken the lead with a statement asking seven critical questions of how the club is being run, what direction they are moving in.

After the comments in The Sun and club statement the opposition to the way that Celtic is running has strengthened which is exactly when an experienced Chairman should set in to provide some direction.

No action has been taken against The Sun with no comment from the club announcing their unhappiness that a senior figure is involved in a cowardly attack on a manager that has delivered success on the pitch and bolstered the Balance Sheet.

As well as Lawwell Non Executive Directors Dermot Desmond, Sharon Brown and Tom Allison also opted out of being faced with protests from the Celtic support.

Rodgers didn’t go through any third party to share his thoughts on the actions of a senior figure running to a newspaper to air their complaints.

At a media conference on Friday he said:

It was interesting when I was shown that. My honest take, I thought it was a cowardly action by whoever it is. It’s not something that you would want, and certainly my relationships with the guys that I’m close with here with the board, I’m struggling to understand the why.

Since 2016, all I’ve tried to do is drive the club forward. Was I surprised by it? Not really. I think I was briefed upon the first time I was here, when I left. Now, since I’ve come back. I’m thick-skinned. It’s because I want to do so well here. I’m determined to do so well.

But I know Dermot, Michael, the guys that I work with on a day-to-day basis, or certainly communicate with them on a day-to-day basis. They feel the same as I.

I think if you speak to my staff here, speak to players, they know all I ever do is give everything for them. I respect them. Most of them have got new contracts during their time here. Staff have got new deals and you know, increase their wages and so all the conditions for them.

And okay, my drive is to make Celtic the best it can be. But not unrealistic, not Premier League money. Not you know, millions and millions and millions. So yeah, it’s disappointing. Like I said, it’s a cowardly act. It just makes me more determined to succeed.

There was no mention of Lawwell during Rodgers’ 32 minute media conference.

In four years as CEO Michael Nicholson hasn’t conducted a single one-to-one interview, not even with Gerry McCulloch for club media.

With the club Chairman now failing to even turn up to watch the team playing there is a real vacuum of leadership pushing more and more responsibility onto the shoulders of Rodgers who is nine months away from the end of his Celtic contract.