features

By Phil Gordon

In the build-up to an Old Firm game, few managers waste their thoughts on anything but the tried and tested players who can make the difference come the big day. Gordon Strachan, however, probably bucks that trend.

The Celtic manager heard yesterday that the club had been given detailed planning permission for their proposed new Ł10 million training facility and sports academy to the north of Glasgow. That will put Celtic at the cutting edge for youth development in Europe and Strachan believes the payoff will be there in future generations for either himself, or his successors, to have talented home-grown players to choose from instead of spending Ł 20 million in the transfer market, as Martin O’Neill was able to do.

Celtic’s 50-acre facility at Lennoxtown, north of the city, will see the club move away from its dog-eared training facility at Barrowfield, just 800 yards from Celtic Park in the east end of Glasgow, and replace it with a greenfield site with views of the Campsie Hills.

If Celtic have lagged behind Rangers, who moved into their Ł14 million Murray Park complex four years ago, they have spent their money — around Ł2 million a year — on coaching rather than bricks and mortar.

“This is a significant step towards the realization of Lennoxtown as the new training facility,” a club spokesman said. “However, we still have to resolve several issues before we can give the final go-ahead.”

The evidence of the good work overseen by Tommy Burns, who is head of youth development, is that the club have had a clean sweep of honors at every level. The reserves, packed full of young players, have just clinched their championship for the fifth successive season while the under-19 side won the Scottish Premier League youth championship.

The fruits of all that labor have been there for Strachan to choose from this season. He has made extensive use of Shaun Maloney, Stephen McManus, Aiden McGeady, Ross Wallace and Craig Beattie to augment his purchases. The hope is that the academy will help to strengthen the playing squad further in years to come.

Strachan admits that luring top-class players to Scotland is a tough proposition. “An agent said to me once that you have to blindfold a player and gag them to get them up here — then put a big wad in their pocket,” he said. “So it is definitely not easy.”

Ray Clarke, the chief scout, is presently scouring the world for possible signings. “I wouldn’t expect too much from Ray because it’s a lot of hard work to get who you are after,” Strachan said. “Everyone is trying to discover gems. But, even when the likes of Arsenal get kids at 15 and 16, a lot of money is changing hands.

“Don’t think they just come along for the good of their health. You won’t get the world’s top players who are at their peak at the moment because they will go elsewhere. What you to try to do is nick some younger ones, or men that no one has yet discovered, like Maciej Zurawski or Shunsuke Nakamura. Hopefully, you can give them the platform they will enjoy.”

Strachan believes competing in the Champions League could entice top players to Celtic Park. “It is useful,” he admitted. “Most players, if they one day want to play in the Spanish or Italian leagues, have to do well in the Champions League. So they have to get themselves on the platform of the competition to achieve that and we are giving them the chance to perform on that platform.”

McGeady is the jewel in the Celtic youth development crown. The Glaswegian teenager made his debut at 17, scoring against Heart of Midlothian, and has already been capped by Ireland, whom he chose to represent. Now 19, he scored in Celtic’s 3-0 win over Rangers at Celtic Park in November and has just returned from a knee ligament injury that kept him out for four months. In his absence, Roy Keane has been added to Celtic’s midfield rotation but McGeady shows signs of being around for a long time.

Indeed, he feels that there are others ready to step up too from his peer group. “The reserves have now won a fifth title and the youth team have already wrapped up theirs,” he said. “That shows you there are a lot of good young players coming through. It also shows the quality of coaching from Willie McStay, Kenny McDowall and Danny McGrain.

“They are excellent coaches and, hopefully, a few of the teenagers will now come through. I am sure the manager will put some in at some point. He has already done that with me.”

McGeady believes the hunger to prove their critics wrong drove Celtic to the Bank of Scotland Premierleague title. The Ireland international insists Celtic are every bit as good as they have been in the past. The CIS Insurance Cup and league trophy might be safely in the cabinet, but McGeady feels the players still want to finish the season in some style.

“As a Celtic player you want to go out and win every game,” he said. “You also want to play with style, and just because we have won the title, it doesn’t mean that we’ll just be seeing out the season or looking at matches as just another game.

“Our aim is to get as many points as possible this season and take as many wins as we can from our remaining games. The 100-points target is something we wanted to achieve but that’s just slipped from our grasp with the draw against Hibernian, but the main thing is that we have won the title as we had the incentive to prove wrong those people who wrote us off at the start of the season.

“People have said that we’ve not been as good as we have been in recent seasons but Hearts had a good year and are in second place, Hibernian and Kilmarnock have been strong and Rangers have done well in Europe. We have won the league and the League Cup and that speaks for itself.”

McGeady is relishing the chance to wreck Rangers’ Champions League hopes at Celtic Park on Sunday and believes his team-mates can play with freedom, unlike their opponents. “We have some tough games ahead against four of the country’s top six teams,” he added. “The good thing is that we already have the championship wrapped up. We are not going into a similar scenario as last season where the games are so nerve- racking. I am not saying we can relax but we can certainly enjoy them a little more now.”

McGeady is also looking forward to showing the “real Celtic” in the Champions League next season. He feels the competition cannot come soon enough so they can lay the ghost of the 5-0 defeat to Artmedia Bratislava.

McGeady told Celtic View: “We want to show that this season’s European outing was not the real Celtic. That would help to get rid of the bad memories, and next year to get to the second round would be great.”