LIAM BRADY was named as Billy McNeill’s successor as Celtic manager in June 1991.
The charismatic Irishman arrived with a dream for the club, but his vision had become blurred by the time he departed in early October 1993.
In another CQN EXCLUSIVE series, author Alex Gordon opens his book files to look back at an intriguing and compelling chapter in the club’s history.
Here in the concluding extract from Alex’s tribute book, ‘The Winds of Change‘, published by CQN in 2015.
Please enjoy.
IT COULD be debated that Liam Brady was the right man in the right place at the wrong time.
His vision for Celtic was the one any supporter would have encouraged. However, things can get slightly blurred when you are not contesting with your main rivals on a level playing field.
Brady was forced to try to get the best out of some individuals who, deep down, he realised were not what he would call Celtic class. Walter Smith spent more on one player – Duncan Ferguson at £4million – than Brady spent during his entire stay at Parkhead.
In his three close seasons at the club, Rangers lavished £16million in total in bringing in new talent. It was the sort of financial muscle Brady could only dream about.
OOPS…Liam Brady holds a Celtic scarf upside-down on his first day.
The Irishman arrived at Celtic Park as a decent, dignified, cultured human being and left with those precious qualities intact. Two months after exiting Celtic, in mid-December 1993, Brady was appointed manager of Brighton in the old English Division Two.
The club, like Celtic, were experiencing financial difficulties and were second bottom of the league at the time of the Irishman’s arrival. He managed to get them to mid-table safety by the end of the season. They performed in much the same manner with the same outcome in his second term before he left the club by ‘mutual consent’ in November 1995.
His managerial career was over at the age of thirty-nine.
Liam Brady’s journey into football management should have been a monumental expedition. Instead, alas, it was merely an excursion.
* DON’T miss the big-name EXCLUSIVES – only in your champion CQN.
