Hartson happy to stay with Hoops

Celtic striker John Hartson claims he has no intention of leaving Parkhead - although he admits he is in the dark as to whether manager Martin O’Neill will pledge his long-term future to the club.

Despite being linked to the vacant Leeds United job, O’Neill insists he will see out the final year of his contract at Celtic and will hold talks with major shareholder Dermot Desmond to thrash out his long-term future.

Irish Prime Minister Bertie Aherne was at the Hoops’ pre-season friendly against Shamrock Rovers at Dublin’s Tolka Park yesterday and O’Neill is understood to have been flown in Aherne’s helicopter to a horse-racing get-together in Limerick to meet with Desmond.

Although some doubt surrounds O’Neill’s future at Celtic beyond next year, Hartson insists the same does not apply to him.

He initially found the impressive strike partnership of Henrik Larsson and Chris Sutton hard to break up but an injury to Sutton in the latter half of last season allowed Hartson a lengthy run in the team.

He remains determined to stay at Celtic and fight for his place in the first team next season and insists he will only leave if he is shown the door by O’Neill.

He said: ‘‘Until the manager actually calls me into the office, then I don’t take a lot of notice of the speculation about my own future.

‘‘You hear things from agents and different people but, until I hear anything from the gaffer I’ve just got to believe that he’s happy with what I’m doing.

‘‘We are all professionals and we all have a job to do. We’re all trying to get fit and we’re all looking forward to playing in that first game on August 3.’’

Hartson picked up the man of the match award from Celtic’s first pre-season game against Shelbourne on Saturday after netting twice but he admits he still has a long way to go before being fully ready for the new campaign.

He added: ‘‘I’m not up to where I want to be just yet but we have a month before the first game so there will be plenty of training and then I’ll be hitting top form.

‘‘The only time I felt bad last season was when I wasn’t starting games, especially the European games.

‘‘I finished last season very strong because I went for about six months without missing a game.

‘‘Obviously I knew it was going to be difficult to break in to the team at the beginning of last season because of the season the boys had just had.

‘‘I just hope to start this year where I left off last season.’’