Loss of indomitable spirit is worry for Lennon

AN INTERNATIONAL break is normally a chance for club managers to take stock of the season so far and come up with solutions to what has gone wrong. Right now, though, it will surely take Neil Lennon far longer than a fortnight to work out how to get Celtic back into the league race.

Sunday’s 2-0 defeat by Hearts was the Glasgow club’s third in just nine matches, which is just one fewer than they suffered in the SPL last season – and those four defeats, it will be remembered, were enough to deny them the championship. Even allowing for the high probability that Rangers, currently ten points ahead, will themselves suffer a drop in form at some stage, it is clear that Celtic have very little room for error if they are to bring their rivals’ run of three championships to an end.

If some quirk of misfortune had caused one or more of their losses, Lennon would have less cause for concern, and more reason for concluding that his luck would level out over the course of the campaign. But there was little or no element of bad luck about those games – and quite a bit of evidence that Celtic are lacking direction.

Last season, adversity bred unity both within the club, and between the club and its supporters, as the manager was subjected to threats and an attack. The flaws were laid bare in the defeat at Inverness which decided the title, but the competitive spirit was there all right. Even on the afternoon when Rangers secured the championship, the display of defiance within Celtic Park was remarkable.

That unity is gone now, replaced by a fractious atmosphere in which too many players are indulging in indiscipline, and Lennon’s suitability to lead the club is beginning to be called into serious question. And that indiscipline, as invariably happens, has been accompanied by a loss of form.

Kris Commons was the worst offender on Sunday, being shown a straight red card for an over-the-top tackle on Hearts’ Adrian Mrowiec. The Scotland international was on fire during the latter stages of last season, but so far this season has lost his place in the national squad and in his club side – the latter because of injury, said Lennon, although Commons himself insisted he was fit.

The midfielder showed a couple of decent touches in the first-half at Tynecastle, and on another day might even have scored, but he has lost his zip, and appears to have gained a few pounds. Lennon understandably singled him out for criticism after the game, but the deeper, more general concern for the manager has to be the reaction the rest of the team showed once they were a man down.

In years past, on countless occasions, Celtic have shown an indomitable spirit when in a tight spot. On Sunday they wilted. You could almost see the lack of self-belief sweep over them, as one by one they gave up hope of getting back into the match.

There was simply no-one out there with the character or the conviction to provide leadership. No-one able or willing to dig in and put up a fight. No-one capable of imposing himself on the game.

This is not primarily a question of technical ability: the roll-call of the most inspiring leaders at the club over the decades includes some who would never profess to be blessed with finesse. The point is that without those leaders, whoever they are, whatever their standard of play, the cause is lost.

After the game, Lennon remarked on the absence through injury of Scott Brown, Beram Kayal and Joe Ledley, but rightly said he was not using that absence as an excuse. Brown’s drive, in particular, was missed, but a club of Celtic’s resources cannot rely on one man to act as a spark plug: they should have half a dozen or more capable of standing up and taking responsibility.

What they have instead is a number of individuals who inspire trepidation among their supporters in defence and dismay further forward.

Daniel Majstorovic, for example, is an imposing figure and quite an insightful talker about the game – but a centre-half who lacks the kind of sure-footedness needed to instil self-belief in the rest of the team. Up front, Mo Bangura is the sort of striker who must make team-mates wonder if it is worthwhile continuing to supply him with inch-perfect crosses.

Bangura is part of a group of close-season signings who do not look a patch on those who arrived at the club in the summer of 2010. Then, the signings of Kayal, Emilio Izaguirre and Gary Hooper appeared to show Lennon had an eye for a player who would fit in swiftly to his team. So far at least, those more recent acquisitions have provided evidence to the contrary.

The league race has a long way to go, and there will be many unforeseen twists between now and May. It was only a few weeks ago, for instance, that Ally McCoist, not Lennon, was the man under pressure – the same McCoist who has now had the best start to an SPL season of any Rangers manager since Bill Struth.

But the difference between the two Glasgow clubs is that Rangers maintained their focus when they were undergoing that difficult start to the season. Celtic’s focus, by contrast, has blurred in recent weeks, and Lennon has a major task on his hands if he is to provide them with renewed vision any time soon.