Neil Lennon is, without doubt, one of the most successful players and managers the club has ever had.
As a player, the Northern Irishman won five league titles, four Scottish Cups and two League Cups which included Celtic’s first treble since the Jock Stein era.
Lennon was also part of the famous Martin O’Neill side that reached the 2003 UEFA Cup Final alongside other legends like Chris Sutton and Henrik Larsson.
When Gordon Strachan became the manager, Lennon was involved in coaching at the club but when Tony Mowbray arrived at Celtic in 2009, all that changed.
Lennon’s ‘hard time’ at Celtic under Tony Mowbray
Tony Mowbray’s appointment at Celtic, from what I can remember, was generally well-received by the fans at the time.
The former Hibs gaffer played a style of attacking football that appealed to the supporters and hopes were high that he could continue the success of Strachan and O’Neill before him.
And to do that, you would think that calling on the experience of Neil Lennon would be critical in that. But it wasn’t to be as Scott Brown shares how Mowbray really felt about the Celtic icon.
Brown said [World Football Index], “When Gordon [Strachan] left the club and was replaced by Tony Mowbray, the lads wanted him to be around the staff as he was under Gordon but sadly that was not to be.
“Lenny had a hard spell with Tony Mowbray and Peter Grant because they did not want him at the club but all of us knew long-term that Lenny was a man that had the club at heart and wanted to work harder than anyone else.
“So, it was the best possible scenario that he was able to come back as manager at the time of Tony’s departure from the club.”
As Brown said, Lennon returned to the club as manager after Mowbray’s sacking and brought another level of unprecedented success to the club.
Leading Celtic to another three league titles and two Scottish Cups as well as into the last 16 of the Champions League [UEFA] looking back, Mowbray may well regret letting someone go that could have had a huge influence on how his time at Celtic panned out.