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Originally transcribed by Tony Cummins.
Interview with Jock Brown, GM of Celtic Football Club, with Radio Scotland on Saturday 9th August 1997.
I missed the very first few seconds of the interview while trying to set up a tape, here's the rest of it.
Richard Gordon: "……….given all the problems he,(di Canio), brought to the club, you must be relieved to be rid of that surely ?
Jock Brown: "Well I think it's obvious that there was a cloud over the place while this saga continued. In these circumstamces, I suppose, it is a blessing he's not there, yes.
RG: "You spent weeks Jock telling us that he wasn't for sale, exactly what happened last week to change that ?
JB: " Well I spent weeks saying he wasn't for sale and that I'd continually review the situation, but that seems to have been lost in many places and the review of any situation you take is absolutely crucial. I kept on saying that and that was the position. The other thing that disappoints me rather in the portrayal of the situation is the overlooking of variuos important factors, but I can influence that so there is nothing I can do about it.
RG: "Do you feel, quite simply, that you've been wronged by the media quite simply in the way that this has been covered in the last few days ?
JB: "Nah, I'm not going to get into whether I've been wronged or what by the media, it doesn't matter what happens to me, all that matters is what happens to Celtic Football Club, and if CFC come out with the right result, and CFC come out properly – that's what matters. What happens to me in that context is irrelevant.
RG: " Would you not accept that comments you made during the past few weeks did mislead the Celtic fans, because it wasn't the media thatgot it wrong, it was yourself.
JB: " No. I don't accept that for one minute, I don't accept that at all.
RG: " Celtic fans continually heard you say PDC will be remaining at this club, he won't be allowed to work his ticket out of the club. They must have believed he was staying ?
JB: "Yes, but they could also have been told that I was saying that I would be constantly reviewing the situation and that's only prudent management. You're in situational management circumstances and you have to react to the situation. Now, that was a very important factor for me and I kept on saying that, I was saying that all the way down the line, and it was the case that he was never for sale; that is still the case – he was never for sale, and if you think to me, if you were to suggest to me that when the agenda began PDC thought he'd finish up at SheFfield Wed., with great respect to them, I don't think you'd be right.
RG: "But he did think he'd end up in the Premiership, and that's what it was all about surely ?
JB: " Well I don't know about that, the agenda was there, I mentioned the agenda from the start,but the situation was that we wanted Regi Blinker, the club that had him expressed an interest in PDC which I resisted for about a month. And then with the constant review of the situation I took a decision that a deal was sensible, especially when the terms were very,very good for Celtic.
RG: "You reported it about a month ago saying that "if he's trying to engineer his way out of Celtic he's wasting his time." He wasn't, was he ? He won in the end ?
JB: "Well he was wasting his time in the sense that he was goingto control what happened. One of the factors, which has caused me such heavy criticism is what happened at a press conference on tuesday when I said he was not for sale and what people forget to appreciate is that the most interested party to anything I was saying was PDC. At that particular point he had missed several commitments to Sheffield to appear for talks, and the last word I had before that press conference was that the deal was almost certainly off. Now, in these circumstances, for me to start talking about availability to speak to clubs simply opened the door for a floodgate of other clubs to come in and try to bid and allow Di Canio to dictate the agenda. That wasn't to happen.
RG:" Well I think people would accept that if that was what happened, then clearly, you had to hold something back. Did you believe then at that late stage PDC was trying to engineer a move to an even bigger club.
JB:" Yes. (Silence)
RG: "Which really is quite remarkable. You talk about that press conference, you said, I'm assuming it was that press conference you were talking about, that the journalists didn't ask the right questions and therefore you didn't have to release the information. What were the right questions ?
JB:"The right questions were, Have Sheffield had express permission from you to deal with PDC and his representatives ? Or #2 Had I given express permission to Moreno Roggi for PDC to talk to Sheffield ? These questions were not asked.
RG:" So had they been asked, you'd have admitted that you had sent a fax to Sheffield authorising PDC to speak to SW ?
JB:" Well I don't know actually, I might have terminated the press conference and say I wasn't prepared to answer – and left the obvious answers. My mistake, there's no question I've made some mistakes and I wouldn't hide from that, I made some mistakes in the handling, particularly in the sense that I allowed the press conference to continue. I don't seem to get much credit for the fact that I stayed and took the barrage of questions that came my way. I did not tell a lie at any time, I dealt with all the questions that came towards me, and the reporting that followed thereafter, I have to say, it seems to me missed out various salient points.
RG:" But isn't that your job now, to field questions from the media, who are in effect asking questions that the fans want answered ?
JB:" That was exactly why I stayed at the press conference. If that hadn't been my role…..(RG interrupts)
RG:" So you don't expect credit for doing that ?
JB: "No,no that's my role, that's what I though was my role, but it has happened that it has come back to haunt me to some extend. But I don't regret doing that, I still think it was the right thing to do, I think it had to work on the basis that I had to make certain that Celtic's interests were protected right down the line subject to the fact that I would not tell any lies – and I didn't – I answered the questions as they came in, I had to fence with them, there isn't any question about that and I reflect on that and think maybe I shouldn't have done that. But that's hindsight again, at the time in question my overriding concern, as it remains to this day, is that all over welfare of CFC and the generation of the best possible conclusion to a very nasty situation, created may I say by some one else. It seems to have been forgotten that their was someone else who played a very important role in creating the whole situation.
RG: " Do you mean PDC ?
JB: " Of course I do.
RG: "OK, what is the difference between traded and sold ?
JB: "The difference is vast. Our position at Celtic was that we would not sell him for money, we would make that stand. Our position then was that the coach wanted Regi Blinker badly, I hope we'll see very soon why that's the case, and I spent a month trying to do that deal without PDC being involved. Then as the situation kept moving, evolving and changing, it became apparent to me that the benefits of Blinker and solving this long running saga greatly out weighed the possibility of making this continued stance to leave him in Italy, with constant pressure from every source day to day, on what was going on. i was very concerned that this feeling might eventually reach the dressing room.
RG: "Wouldn't it have been better just to say " We want rid of PDC" ? Every player is available for transfer surely at the right price ?
JB: " That's an interesting point Richard, you can, lets say….who have we got…. say Hendrik Larssen's not for sale.
RG: " A ten million pound bid ?
JB: " If twenty million pounds was offered tomorrow we'd need to stop and look. Obviously, that's just sensible prudent management. But it would be prefectly true to say that he's not for sale. You've got a house there and you say – my house is not for sale, I'm not moving – and someone comes and offers you ridiculous money, you'd review your situation and change your mind. Who could criticise you and say you were deceiving and telling lies ?
RG: " Jock you were critical of the media there. If you were still at the BBC doing your old job, wouldn't you be asking questions of a manager who said a player's not for sale, and then 24hrs later sold him ?
JB: " Not if I also was reporting the fact that I said he's not for sale, that's our position but of course that's a situation that's being reviewed on a daily basis. In fact, one question asked of me at that press conference was " is it the case that it is being review on an hourly basis ?" and I said "yes, that is correct. Now, if I'd been told all of that then I'd have taken no exception to what happened over the next 24hrs.
RG: "OK. What was PDC's little problem, was he asking for as has been reported, an extra six thousand pounds per week.
JB: " No, I never raised a figure at any time. What I said was that the problem that was referred to me was the fact that he wanted an increase in salary and I said at the time that the increase sought was more than virtually every player in Scotland earned outwith the Old-Firm. I never put a figure on it.
RG: " I wasn't suggesting you had, but I've certainly seen that figure quoted. I that a sort of ballpark figure ?
JB: " I'm not prepared to comment on what the figures were precisely.
RG: " Would you have considered giving him a rise if not the sort of money he was asking for ?
JB: " That didn't come into it as it was abundantly clear that that wasn't what this was really about, it was about working his ticket to get out. That was the agenda to which I made reference. It was on that basis that a stance had to be taken and that stance was taken. I'm told about the fact that he has won the day, I ask you again – do you really think he expected to end up at Sheffield ? I have my doubts, and what did happen incidentally, I'm saying to you that my position on tuesday was such that it had to be made absolutely clear to him that there was no question of him being on the open market because he wasn't and I contact other clubs. That was extremely important for him to get that message and, more importantly, his agent got that message amd that was quite clearly portrayed. So from that point of view it was absolutely essential that strength of position was maintained. As it happened. one other club did come in at the 11th hour when they read the press and they said "can we make an offer for PDC" and I said "you cannot – there is no point. There is no question of him being available for sale." And that was my position and remained my position right to the end.
RG: " OK. So the bottom line is, had Regi Blinker not been available, PDC would have remained a Celtic player ?
JB: " He would have remained a Celtic player at this point with the situation constantly and daily, even hourly, under review.
RG: " I guess the irony of this is that most people would probably agree that it's been a great piece of business, but Celtic basically lost the chance to get a huge amount of positive publicity getting rid of a bad apple in the dressing room because of the stance, and the way what you say was that it was misreported.
JB: " Well, in fairness, I'm not saying misreported. I'm saying there was elements in it which disappointed me in the sense that the full picture, IMO, was not considered and looked at and taken on board. I did say on Wednesday the deal actuallt came on at 9pm on tuesday night – that's absolutely true – until that point, in my view, the deal was not on in either respect. The misreporting aspect, I'm not making comment on that, I'm just saying that I'm disappointed that the full picture has not been protrayed. The reason I'm disapponted is because there was a tendency to suggest to the Celtic supporters that they had been misled. Now I would regret that bitterly if the Celtic supporters were misled because that was never my intention and would never be my intention. What I had to do was ensure that I introduced the appropriate qualifications to everything I was saying to maintain the appropriate level of integrity and honour in the whole situation while, at the same time serving Celtic's purposes correctly and properly. I think I managed to work that balance, now the fact that it is reported differently I have no control over.
RG: "OK. That's getting back to the point where you feel you did not milead the Celtic supporters and therefore it was the media who distorted it ?
JB: " What I'm saying is that the elements that I continually set, not just for tuesday and wednesday, for a long time before that, about any situation we are dealing with, prudent management says you take a position and you review it constantly and that's exactly what I've been doing all down the line. Now the review procedure was greatly influenced by Regi Blinker's position and the fact that we wanted him and that meant there was the possibility eventually of bringing a matter to a conclusion which had been a bad one for the club for a long time, created incidentally not by anyone at CFC, we has an opportunity to do that, we had to weigh up the review procedure and the decision taken eventually, at 9pm on tuesday night was that it was, so we moved on it. I knew perferctly well what was coming after that but that wasn't significant in term of the whole exercise that I was going to take some stick, what was significant and the only thing that mattered was that the Celtic position was protected and Celtic got the correct result from this whole procedure.
RG: " OK. A few other areas just quickly if we can. The 3 Million pounds that you did get as part of the trade for PDC, will that be spent on new players ?
JB: "That is certainly the intention.
RG: " The deadline is Aug 15th for the next round of the UEFA Cup, is it a priority to beat that ?
JB: " Well I'm already very active on that front and I would hope that there would be further developments before that deadline expires.
RG: "Is it likely then that you'll be on business and not in Austria with the team.
JB: " That is almost certain.
RG: " Jorge Cadete, what's the latest there ?
JB: "There's no change from yesterday's position.
RG: " Are you prepared to trade Jorge Cadete ?
JB: " No I 've said from day one, and I hope I will be accurately reported on this one, I've said that there were a number of possibilities for Jorge Cadete, one of which was transfer. It was not our preferred option, it was well down the list of preferred options, but it remained an option and still remains an option in that category.
RG: " But the problem is that you have no timescale ?
JB: " Well that's the saddest part Richard, that we cannot begin to do that because of his health position.
RG: " I know that you've been out (in Lisbon), do you intend going back to see Jorge and see how he's fairing ?
JB: " If that is in the interests of Jorge Cadete and Celtic Football club i'll be happy to do that, i'll be willing to do that.
RG: " OK. Just finally Jock, don't you wish you were sitting behind the monitor and the microphone at Almondvale (Livingston v Hearts) this afternoon ?
JB: " Well I always miss that, I missed it last week. I think about it constantly at games at the moment. It was a huge decision not to be behind the microphone. What I will say to you is the challenge here is substantial, it's one that I relish and it's one that I intend to enjoy as well as endure and while I miss the commentating I'm involved in something else that is very exciting.
RG: " Don't you think about it particularly during press conferences ?
JB: " Well the press conference situation is interesting, but again I know most of the people there, I'm now in a different position. Part of the thing about these situations is that it is my job to co-operate with the press while at the same time maintaining the necesssary confidentiality in the interests of CFC and of course, it's the job of the journalists to hear from me what I tell them and then to try to find out the things I don't want to tell them. Now I understand that as well as anybody else and I'm quite happy to operate in that field but I do hope that they respect the fact that, frequently it is utterly vital that, in the interests of doing the job properly for Celtic that the confidentiality is maintained at my end. I would remind everyone again of 1989 and Maurice Johnston.
RG: " On that note let's leave it…………………….."