Martin O'Neill put on the spot over Celtic's European failings as he holds Europa League hope
Celtic lost their most recent Europa League match against Benfica on Thursday.
Manager Martin O’Neill insists he has full belief that Celtic can make their way out of the Europa League’s league phase - as he faces questioning over the club’s recent continental record.
A brutal Champions League play-off loss to LASK has been compounded by two defeats in the competition below. Ferencvaros defeated the Premiership champions on matchday one and Benfica inflicted a 4-1 defeat upon the Hoops on Thursday. Celtic returned from the international break with a 2-0 league win at Motherwell and host Hearts this Sunday.
Europe was the main focus midweek though and the manager was put on the spot over who is to blame for the club’s decline in European performance over the years. O’Neill insists he’d need more than the platform of his post-match press conference to make a full assessment having not been at the club throughout the entirety of that period. He responded: “That's a big, big question.
Martin O’Neill on European decline at Celtic
“I haven't seen all the things that have happened over the last 20 odd years. I have just spoken to the Benfica manager before the game and naturally, although he wasn't here at the time, but they are massively disappointed that they're not in the Champions League and they could give a good account of themselves.
“There's some really serious teams in this Europa League and, that aside, your question demands a longer answer than I can give at this minute.”
He added on the game Celtic lost in Lisbon: “Naturally disappointed to lose the match. At 2-0, we have a fantastic chance to make it 2-1, spurned that, and a couple of minutes later they make it 3-0, but I thought the second half performance, I thought we were absolutely excellent.
“The substitutions were very strong there, the substitutes coming on, Haissem Hassan on one side and young Callum Osmand on the other side. Considering he wasn't even in the squad last Sunday, he's coming back from injury and I thought he did brilliantly.
“We created about five great chances in the game. We hit the woodwork I think three times. There's always the possibility of Benfica on the break scoring against us as they did. I get great encouragement for this and even though we've lost the two games and we're down to six matches, I genuinely believe that we can make it.”
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