Major Celtic next manager development as club breaks silence on hunt and Martin O'Neill addresses situation

Celtic have been searching for a replacement for Brendan Rodgers for three weeks after he resigned from his position in the wake of a 3-1 defeat by Hearts. His exit was swiftly followed by a stinging statement from major shareholder Dermot Desmond, who hit out at the Northern Irishman’s actions in the build-up to his departure.

O’Neill was swiftly installed as a caretaker boss alongside assistant Shaun Maloney and has presided over four matches - two league wins over Falkirk and Kilmarnock, a Premier Sports Cup semi-final victory over Rangers and Europa League reversal by Midtjylland.

It had been anticipated that Celtic would appoint a permanent successor to Rodgers during this international break, with Columbus Crew manager Wilfried Nancy holding advanced talks with the club’s hierarchy over the weekend. However, the process remains incomplete, with the defending Premiership champions releasing a statement on Monday evening with an update to supporters.

It read: “As Celtic Football Club continues with the process to appoint our next permanent manager, we can confirm that Martin O’Neill and Shaun Maloney will continue to manage first-team matters on an interim basis, until this process is complete. We will update supporters further as soon as possible.”

O’Neill explained that he would be happy to take the team against the Buddies in Paisley on Saturday night. The 73-year-old took training on Monday and said he “would see what the next couple of days would bring”.

“First things first, I enjoyed the couple of days off because it was a bit of a whirlwind fortnight beforehand,” said O’Neill to Celtic TV, “but if there’s not an announcement now in the next few days, then I’m happy to still be here for the weekend game against St Mirren.

“First of all, we want the players coming back from international matches unscathed, which is the most important thing for us just now, now that we’ve got a few injuries to contend with.

“So whatever sort of squad we had for the Kilmarnock game, I wouldn’t mind having roughly the same again, but we can only deal with what we have and what we want to do, and we just want to play as strongly as we possibly can. But let’s see what the next couple of days bring.”