CELTIC No.2 Chris Davies has defended Brendan Rodgers following the verbal volley Hearts interim Head Coach Jon Daly.
The Tynecastle caretaker branded the Hoops boss’ assessment of Ian Cathro’s sacking as “disgusting, disgraceful and disrespectful” following his side’s 4-1 thumping at Parkhead at the weekend.
Davies, though, hit back and claimed his gaffer was within his rights to offer his opinion on the rookie Edinburgh coach he believed did not have the proper backing from within the club.
The assistant manager insisted Rodgers is only focused on Kilmarnock in the Betfred League Cup-tie tonight and said: “I’ve worked with Brendan for a long, long time and he always bases his work around respect.
“Respect for opposition managers and opposition players. So, it’s been blown out of proportion a little bit. We have more important things to think about – as have Hearts.
“If you look into what he was saying, it was more related to showing support for another manager and, like we do with other teams, looking at where they are at and what their team has been like.
“He certainly didn’t intend to offend anybody or anything like that.
“Brendan has had a long management career, nearly 10 years, and is not one who has volatile public relations with other managers.
“He’s a respectful guy and will try and answer the media in an open, respectful way. It’s not something Brendan is worried about or has any issues about.
“He’s not someone who’s always sitting there thinking about the wider picture in football. He’s mostly thinking about how he can make Celtic the best we can be.
“That’s his driver. It’s always his focus. How can we get better? How can we keep this going?”
“We’ll just carry on focusing on the important stuff, which is Kilmarnock.
“It starts with Celtic for him. That’s what he’s looking at. Yes, he’s got his views on different situations and he has expressed them before, but that’s not his priority.
“We are here at Celtic and we have more important things to worry about than management teams and other clubs.
“We’ll move on, there’s no issue. We focus all our energies on Kilmarnock.”
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