Things are not going well for Neil Lennon at the minute. Results on the pitch have been well below expectations, with Celtic's slim chances at retaining their league title slowly slipping away.
Then you have the issues off the pitch. The club were recently heavily criticised after the first team went on a trip to Dubai, after which one of their players tested positive for coronavirus. As a result, 13 members of the squad as well as the coaching staff had to self-isolate due to government guidelines.
Lennon returned to media duties this afternoon after his isolation period ended and he was certainly in a fighting mood.
Speaking at his press conference ahead of Wednesday's game against Livingston, he slammed everyone from the media, pundits, and the Scottish Government for their coverage of the Dubai trip. This was despite the fact that another member of the team has now tested positive for the virus.
🗣Neil Lennon blasts the #SNP government, Andy Walker and the media in an explosive press conference. Don’t miss the football show today on #Youtube #Facebook live and here at 4pm #Celtic #NeilLennon pic.twitter.com/gFPkokhYGo
— PLZ Soccer (@PLZSoccer) January 18, 2021
Another player has been deemed positive, it is someone who is self-isolating.
Everybody’s negative, the whole squad is negative bar, two players.
I think that’s remarkable and I think it totally blows out of the water the way the trip, the training camp has been portrayed by certain quarters of the media, by certain pundits, and by certain government officials as well.
We did not abuse any ‘privilege’. We did the right things. We were absolutely, totally professional.
We had a little drink in the afternoon on the day off: completely allowed, no law-breaking. Yet we come back to this barrage of absolute hypocrisy.
It’s not as if they were doing a conga in the dressing room and dancing to Baccara – or travelling a train journey from Glasgow to London with Covid.
The fallout from this has been way too much – there’s a bit of bullying going on...
My apology is to the fans because 13 players and three staff had to isolate which is ludicrous. I'm not apologising for anything else.
I'm not apologising for going out there and training for a week. I'm not apologising for the players having a day off.
Lennon's position has manager has been coming under increasing pressure in recent weeks, with this controversy adding to the issues on the pitch.
It is looking unlikely that he will be at the club next season as things stand.
Despite this, Lennon said that there was a political aspect to the fallout from the club's Dubai trip.
There's seems to be some sort of agenda being driven here. We played very well at Ibrox, we didn't deserve to lose the game, we were the better team.
We've come back and we've been absolutely decimated by these rules. I'm not convinced they're a public health issue, it seems political in my opinion.
Nobody has got Covid, our protocols were perfect.
We've been decimated the last two games and the players have done all they can, the ones that were left behind to play the games.
Celtic currently sit 21 points behind Rangers in the league, albeit with three games in hand.
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