Martin O'Neill expecting next Celtic manager 'interesting conversation' with Dermot Desmond

“I must be in consideration,” said O’Neill, whose success since replacing Brendan Rodgers on a supposedly temporary basis in October has been remarkable.

A 3-1 victory over Dunfermline in Saturday’s Scottish Cup final secured the club’s 14th Double and O’Neill’s second as a Celtic manager.

In normal circumstances, the Northern Irishman would be attracting admiring glances from elsewhere. No longer in contract, Celtic would be fearful of losing him.

But he is now in his mid-70s, with a lot more life behind him than in front of him. It’s Celtic or back to being a grandfather – and he doesn’t even know yet if he will have that choice to make.

The players are due back in training in just over a month. If it’s someone to oversee a project that's required by Celtic, with Hearts’ stated ambitions over the next decade perhaps helping concentrate minds at Parkhead, O’Neill questions whether he is the man,

“I would have thought in the last few weeks that they would be looking at options,” he said. “They have to be because pre-season is coming.

“The advantage of us winning the league gives us an extra week. Instead of starting back on the 19th, we start back on the 26th. So Shaun (Maloney) was telling me. But it’ll be an interesting conversation, so we’ll see.

“I don’t think I’ll ever lose the hunger or the passion for the game,” he added. “Honestly, I really don’t.

“When they’re putting a lid on top of me I think I’ll jump up and say ‘what’s the score?’ And hopefully Celtic have scored! But if you’re saying we’d start back in a week’s time, I genuinely couldn’t do that. I’ll have to have a think and I think in the next week I’ll meet up with the owner and see what he’s saying.”

O’Neill in the dark over Celtic plans

O’Neill claims to have little or no idea about the club’s intentions. Celtic have been linked with the likes of Robbie Keane, who has recently left Hungarian side Ferencvaros, Craig Bellamy and Roberto Martinez, with the latter two already in employment at Wales and Portugal respectively. One reported target, Motherwell’s Jens Berthel Askou, has already moved to Toulouse in Ligue 1.

“He (Desmond) hasn’t said anything to me, and I don’t know if that’s good news or bad news,” said O’Neill. “But I will genuinely have a wee look at it to see.

“I’d be thinking, though, that for the football club to go forward properly then they’d probably looking at somebody younger. If you’re asking me if I’d have a project or something like that, no, I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t have it.”

He conceded he needed to re-charge, like every manager after a demanding season. Although O’Neill was hired only in the Autumn before being handed a rest during the Wilfried Nancy experiment, he returned to take part in a gruelling fight to the finish with Hearts. He has also overseen every game of Celtic’s successful Scottish Cup run, including a penalty shootout victory over Rangers at Ibrox.

“There can be no one in this room my age and you’ve got to consider that,” he said. “I can pass it off as a joke, but I really don’t know. I think I must be in consideration for the job, even though it might be for a very short term. I couldn’t do a project.”

Even another 12 months might risk harming his legacy, he mused. “The point is this… it’s all right saying a year and it sounds great today. I am not sure if we lost three of the first five, I’d be welcome. It doesn’t matter who you are. You have to win football matches.”

He did though reveal something worth sticking around for. Asked for an update on Kieran Tierney, who was treated for a long period on the pitch and then limped off in the second half to be replaced by Marcelo Saracchi, O’Neill revealed it was nothing too serious, which will be music to the ears of Scotland manager Steve Clarke.

“One of the things I’d like to stay for next season is so that Kieran completes a game!” smiled O’Neill. “I love him to bits and Shaun keeps coming to me at 55 minutes about him. He is doing my brain in! No, he is fine. He has done brilliantly. I think a real pre-season with him will suit him down to the ground.”

As for Neil Lennon, the defeated manager and O’Neill’s former on-pitch lieutenant, there were some warm words – eventually. Lennon had forced O’Neill’s left arm into the air at the end in an emotional scene between the pair.

“I know he is a wee fat lump, but I love him,” said “O’Neill. “I love him. He pulled me out of the quagmire at Leicester City, honestly, and went on to become a big, big player for the next three or four years. I took him to Celtic and he was really fantastic. He played a major part in proceedings. I don’t think there is anyone better with his career as a player and as a manager (at Celtic). There isn’t.”

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