Aiden McGeady has blamed down-sizing and cost cutting for Celtic’s failure to reach the Champions League. The Everton winger left Parkhead for Spartak Moscow in a £9.5million deal in 2010. In an outspoken appraisal, however, the Republic of Ireland international says his former club have paid a heavy price for delaying their investment in new signings. It (Champions League failure) is a big blow for the club and obviously the people who hold the purse strings at the club,’ said McGeady, ‘but I suppose you get what you pay for in the end if you decide to downsize, cut costs, and don’t pay three, four of five million pounds for players anymore. ‘Then you can’t really expect to get into the Champions League but that’s just the way it is at the minute I think.’ A lifelong Celtic fan McGeady has established himself in the Goodison first team, but admits to keeping a close eye on the fortunes of the Parkhead club. A first team player under Martin O’Neill and Gordon Strachan, the 28-year-old admits he had never heard of coach Ronny Deila before his appointment. ‘I don’t know the new manager. I’ll be honest, I never heard of him before he came in. I was expecting they would put someone in there who is a bit more well known, someone with more pedigree. ‘They started off okay I suppose but things just aren’t going right at the minute. Obviously it’s a combination of everything because you’ve got fans venting frustration at the board for not spending money and then it seemed that every player who was coming in was a loan signing. ‘I still watch all the games I can and obviously want the team to do well. It’s disappointing to see the team doing poorly - but I still think they’ll win the league easily enough.’ HH -PP-
Posted on: Fri, 05 Sep 2014 03:45:14 +0000
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