Ronny Deila believes Celtic continue to wilt under the strain of expectation. Such is the Glasgow club’s superiority in Scotland, attention during Deila’s 14-month reign has turned towards progress – or otherwise – against European opposition. Tuesday night’s pitiful 2-0 loss in Malmo means Celtic have failed to qualify for the Champions League for two years in a row under Deila, with their Norwegian manager pointing towards a curious landscape. He had earlier used “frightened” to describe the approach of his players.
“Everybody knows how much this game meant but it’s not about wanting – it’s about wanting it too much,” Deila said. “The buildup to these games go on for such a long time.
“It’s not only the last week, it has been going on for the last six months talking about the Champions League. That’s OK for me but it’s something we have to deal with. In Malmo, we as a team didn’t handle that very well.
“We played ourselves out and we deserved to go out because we had an OK result from the first leg [a 3-2 victory] and the performance in Malmo was not even close to what we can produce.
“I think we have progressed but in Sweden it looked like we were caught up by the importance of the game.”
Deila must now use the Europa League as a means to win back the hearts and minds of supporters who had earlier backed him to the hilt. Those supporters were not so forgiving in Malmo.
He stopped short of agreement that European football’s second-tier competition is Celtic’s level. “We fight to get into the Champions League, we want to be a Champions League club but you can’t say that when you produce the kind of performance we showed in Malmo,” Deila said. “We didn’t deserve anything more.”
The imminent departure of Celtic’s most saleable asset, Virgil van Dijk, hardly helps the manager’s cause. Neither does a European record that shows 28 goals lost in the 21 matches since Deila was appointed as the successor to Neil Lennon. But for the routine heroics of Craig Gordon in goal, that concession figure would be far higher.
“Everything you learn through experience,” Deila added. “The best players will learn. This is a very disappointed group but it’s happened now. All we can do is try to learn something from what has happened.
“Criticism is the one thing you have to live with in football. I understand that while we are very disappointed, our supporters are disappointed as well. But we win and lose together. We have to cope with it and move on. We have to learn from this and be a better team the next time.”
Deila cut a shellshocked figure in the aftermath of the Malmo affair. Celtic’s latest step towards what is an inevitable reclaiming of the Scottish Premiership continues with the visit of St Johnstone at the weekend.
“It’s not going to take a few weeks [to recover],” Deila insisted. “I have to be ready for Saturday. That’s just how it is. It would be very strange if I was very happy and standing here smiling.
“We have to restore our pride on Saturday. We have to get on track again, get back to winning games and look ahead.”
