O'Neill raises tour doubts

Celtic manager Martin O‘Neill has admitted he may not make it to their pre-season tour at all.

The Hoops boss has already confirmed he will miss the first two friendlies against Chelsea and Liverpool in the United States because of his wife‘s health worries.

He is hoping to join up with his squad in time for the game against Manchester United in Philadelphia before taking on Roma in Canada.

But O‘Neill admits there is a chance he may not be able to oversee any of the tour.

He said: “I‘d certainly hope to get out for our last two games but do I expect to?

“The truth is that will depend a lot on how things are at home.

“I‘m actually reluctant to miss any of it at all because personally I enjoyed last year‘s trip immensely and it doesn’t seem like a year ago that we all flew out to Seattle last time around.

“So I must say that I‘m very disappointed at not making the first part of the trip which I‘m sure the boys will enjoy in my absence.

“But, hopefully provided all goes well, I‘ll be out there by the time we play Manchester United.”

While Old Firm rivals Rangers have spent the summer recruiting six players and handing trials to three more in a bid to bolster their squad further, Celtic have been conspicuous by their absence in the transfer market.

O‘Neill‘s top priority is attempting to fill the gaping void left by the departure of Henrik Larsson and he admits he would have preferred to have had a couple of new faces in place ahead of the pre-season trip.

He told the Celtic View: “I‘m a little disappointed but that‘s just the situation we‘re in.

“Certain circumstances have prevented that, not least my own personal situation, and in an ideal world we would certainly have liked to have brought one or two players out there with us.

“But I will be using the next week while the team are away to attempt to progress some things that we‘re working on.

“That‘s not loose talk – it‘s something we very much want to get done.

“Henrik has gone, as has Johan [Mjallby], as has [Liam] Miller, and when you think about the long-term absentees we have such as Shaun Maloney and John Kennedy, it‘s obvious we need some replacements.

“I would imagine that the positions we want to strengthen are relatively obvious and I‘ll certainly be spending all my available time attempting to do that.

“But replacing players like Henrik while trying to get value for money isn‘t easy and, if getting in later rather than sooner is the order of the day, so be it.”