Neil Lennon admits to frosty relations with Steven Pressley at Celtic

NEIL Lennon yesterday confirmed that relations between him and Steven Pressley were strained when they first became team-mates together at Celtic Park.

The pair will go head-to-head tomorrow afternoon at Hampden Park as managers of Celtic and Falkirk. But the friction dates back to when they were in opposition as players for Celtic and Hearts, revealed Lennon.

“We had a few barneys on the pitch,” he said yesterday, in response to Pressley’s assertion earlier in the week that they had some “frosty” exchanges after he joined Celtic from Hearts in December 2006. There was a particular incident which caused the rift between the players to grow in May of the same year.

After a photograph proved he had been spat on by Rudi Skacel during a game at Tynecastle, Lennon was infuriated by Pressley’s contention that he “always seemed to be the one in the middle of any controversy”. Just months later, they became team-mates at Parkhead and Lennon admitted things were initially uneasy.

“I wasn’t happy with some of the stuff he came out and said publicly, particularly on the spitting incident with Rudi Skacel, and where I was proved right and he [Pressley] was proved wrong,” said Lennon. “That’s the only problem I ever had with him. Thankfully [a newspaper] showed a picture of Skacel spitting at me.”

Lennon and Pressley both became managers within weeks of each other in 2010 and the former admitted they probably got things wrong in the beginning. They were both accused of winding people up, often by opposite numbers. “I think we all do when we start,” said Lennon. “We come in and think we can reinvent the wheel. Over time, we look at our characteristics and things we can improve on.”