Backslapping Celtic board need self awareness as cute Brendan Rodgers comments show who's really driving the process

Bashing Slovan Bratislava after banking even more cash doesn't mean Parkhead powerbrokers have cracked it

There will have been an outburst of backslapping in the Celtic boardroom this week with the Slovan Bratislava bashing a couple of days after announcing bumper financial results.

The Hoops are off to a Champions League flier, unbeaten in the league and set for a crack at the last four of the Premier Sports Cup. It all looks so rosy in the garden the only danger on the horizon is getting hay fever. But the Celtic Park suits shouldn’t be stopping to smell the flowers. They sit pretty right now – but it’s been a thorny path to get here. And for all the high-fiving going on, there should be the self-awareness to accept lessons must be learned.

The board might be feeling pretty chuffed, especially when Brendan Rodgers said on Friday the club had been vindicated its strategy. But it was a cute way of phrasing it. The manager is the one who has been vindicated. It’s Rodgers who wanted the streamlined recruitment process of buying a couple of £10m players rather than scattering £20m on 10 new faces and hoping one or two came good.

It’s only a few weeks since the manager admitted there were issues in the recruitment department that need addressing. A solid final week of the window doesn’t change that. Rodgers rightly hailed the recruitment team for unearthing Arne Engels. But it took until the final days of the window to secure him and the rest of recruitment was pretty much on the boss.

He’s the one who got on the blower to land Kasper Schmeichel. He liked the look of Luke McCowan and jumped when the chance arose. Before then, Rodgers was the man who wanted Adam Idah – who could have been snapped up for far less dosh if the board hadn’t baulked at the fee back in January.

Rodgers has driven the process since the woeful first summer window after his return and that is going to be an issue for the next phase of his masterplan. The Engels deal is the one that will have had the board in cold sweats but that is exactly the kind of business Celtic need to be doing to advance the club.

When you stockpile domestic trophies and have £77million in the bank, no one can accuse the club of not being sensibly run. But that doesn’t mean they get a five-star rating on TripAdvisor. This is Celtic’s 13th crack at the Champions League in 25 years which, when you look under the bonnet, is not exactly great considering their biggest rivals have been a bin fire for 15 of those years.

Poor previous performances have left the coefficient in the gutter and automatic qualification is out of the window again. There needs to be three Engels a season coming in – and that means the recruitment side needs to be sharpened up and the model severely tweaked.

Celtic’s financial statement spoke for itself but “keep doing what we’re doing” isn’t a concrete five-to- 10-year plan. They won’t always have Rodgers to rely on and recruitment and stadium issues will need to be tackled.

Chief executive Michael Nicholson still hasn’t sat down with the media since taking the helm and as long as the punters keep shelling out, they deserve to be kept in the loop. Celtic can’t afford to rest on their laurels as a slap on the back is only a few inches higher than a boot up the backside.

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