O’Neill and Quinn laugh off phone mix-up

MARTIN O’Neill and Brian Quinn have tried to play down a public dispute between the two prime movers at Celtic Park.

Quinn risked sparking a row with O’Neill over player salaries at the club when he rang a wrong mobile number and left a message with a teenage girl.

Quinn, responding to an interview with O’Neill in which the Celtic manager took issue with his chairman’s figures, inadvertently phoned Walsall teenager Kayley Elkington instead of a club public relations officer.

The chairman insists he has already cleared the air with the manager.

Quinn said: “When you reach my age, it is perhaps advisable to steer clear of new-fangled devices like mobile phones!

“I have had a chat with Martin and I will take him through the salary bill with the help of a bottle of wine and my abacus.”

O’Neill said: “As I said last week, there is absolutely no friction between myself, the chairman and the board.

“In fact, I actually find the whole incident quite amusing.”

Quinn’s call was made after O’Neill disputed in a radio interview claims by the Celtic chairman that the club’s wage bill was comparable to the top teams in the Barclays Premiership.

Quinn was quoted as saying in the message: “I’m trying to head off yet another storm created by our esteemed manager who has now, I believe, contradicted the numbers I used in the radio interview.

“I’m not going to be made a liar by Martin O’Neill so you are going to have to try and defuse this.”