Kenny Dalglish says Ange Postecoglou can fulfil all his career ambitions and has everything he needs at Celtic if he can become a Champions League regular.
He believes clinching the title and banking the £30million riches will give the victors a massive advantage over their defeated Glasgow rivals.
Postecoglou has revitalised Celtic in just nine months. The Aussie has built a team which is on the brink of regaining the Premiership and also on course for a Treble in less than a year.
His work has not gone unnoticed. His reputation is soaring and, naturally, admiring murmurs are coming from south of the border.
Recent title winners such as Brendan Rodgers and Steven Gerrard have headed for the Premier League. But Dalglish says Postecoglou can have it all at Celtic due to the size of the club and the chance to mix with the elite.
The former boss reckons it would be “rude” if English chairmen weren’t looking at him, but then said: “He’s at one of the biggest clubs here.
“If he’s got ambition to go to the Premier League, I don’t know. He’s certainly done brilliantly for Celtic and that’s the most important thing.
“It’s not a given but they are obviously favourites to win the league. They’re straight into the Champions League sections.
“Where is he going to go and get a job that will give him that? He might get all he wants here. That might be all he wants.
“I’ll tell you for a fact it wasn’t the first option either of them (Rodgers and Gerrard) got. They had been rattled before, I would imagine. They moved on. The English Premier League is an attraction for managers in Scotland.
“But it’s less attractive if you’ve got a team in Scotland that is getting straight into the Champions League section.
“Everybody is different but it is an attraction for your team to be playing in the Champions League. All right, you will get a couple of bruises because you are going to be in the fourth pot. But you are still playing in it.
“If the club has finances to get players in, managers are looking for help with that. That helps them.
“He was getting the sack after two weeks, he was rubbish and all the rest of it. Now he’s God’s gift. And because he’s God’s gift, people want to move him on or say: 'Should he get a better contract?'
“Jesus, give the guy a chance to breathe. He’s done brilliantly. Everything else will follow. Whatever is going to happen will happen. I don’t think a lot of people up here knew about him. It’s not just in England.
“In Scotland even Celtic fans never knew about him. They would have had very little knowledge of what he had done.
“I think everyone has sat up and taken notice. The job he has done has raised his profile and the one who gets most benefit from that is Celtic.
“He’s done brilliantly. The club has been very patient with him as he got off to a bad start and they stood by him and supported him in going to Japan. If someone goes in and says they are going to Japan for three players, you think: What? Until you see them.
“He’s content. I don’t know what other clubs are doing, but if they are (looking), that’s an endorsement of the good job he’s done.”
A Postecoglou title triumph would be a stunning achievement in a football sense. In a financial sense, it would be a monumental boost in terms of staying ahead in the future.
Dalglish said: “The incentive is you get straight into the Champions League sections.
“That’s a huge uplift to what’s been happening previously. It looks like Celtic’s going to do that and I’m sure the money will be spent on players.
“But whoever wins the league, it’s a great chance to put £30m investment into the club. Just to have the money would be fantastic for either of the two clubs.
“You are better to have it than be without it. It’s going to be more beneficial to you than any of your rivals.
“It’s a great reflection on what Scottish clubs have done in European football that they are now getting straight through.”
Gold can wait. It’s silver that matters most and Postecoglou has connected everyone from the pitch to the stands much in the way Jurgen Klopp has done at Dalglish’s beloved Liverpool.
But Dalglish said: “They’re both very good at their job. That is the only similarity. Everyone has got their own ideas and individuality.
“He had his right at the beginning. It didn’t work too well, maybe he never had the personnel. The board supported him brilliantly. Between the board of directors and Ange selection and ability to pick out players it’s been great teamwork from them behind the scenes.
“For them to support him after putting him in. They thought Eddie Howe was coming in, so to get him in and how well it’s turned out, maybe they think it was a bit of good fortune.”
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