Brendan Rodgers and Ange Postecoglou both brought different qualities to Celtic.
Postecoglou brought an explosive brand of football that excited Celtic supporters, but the Australian could not make it work on the European stage.
Rodgers has a more pragmatic and patient style and whilst it’s not as exciting as Ange’s, the current Celtic manager brought success to Parkhead in the Champions League.
And as former Celtic coach Darren O’Dea embarks on the next stage of his career at Swansea City, the ex-Player Pathway Manager shares who had a ‘huge influence’ on him out of Rodgers and Ange at the Bhoys.
Photo by Richard Sellers/Sportsphoto/Allstar via Getty ImagesSwansea’s Darren O’Dea admits Ange Postecoglou was ‘incredible’ at Celtic
O’Dea joined Celtic in 2019 as the U18s youth coach. He was then promoted to the Celtic B team manager in 2021 under Postecoglou before being elevated to the Player Pathway Manager under Rodgers.
And here, the Swansea City coach shares who out of the two Celtic icons were the biggest influence on his Parkhead career.
O’Dea told The Herald, “Where I am now is down to seven years of really hard work. What I learned at Motherwell and Celtic has been superb.
“Brendan was a pleasure to work under and he was so helpful and generous with his time.
“Ange was incredible. He was a huge influence on me. He mentored me and I’ll always be appreciative of the insight and knowledge he passed on to me.
“My time at Celtic was great. It’s a brilliant football club with an unbelievable fan base.
“I’ll always look back with great fondness of my few years there in the various roles.”
Who is Celtic’s current Player Pathway Manager
When O’Dea left Celtic to take on the Swansea role, the club moved quickly to replace the former defender.
Shaun Maloney is now in the role and it seems that he has a huge part to play in Celtic’s development of youth.
Paul Tisdale said that Maloney is responsible for ‘optimising the talents’ of Celtic’s young players and Rodgers said that he believes the former Hoops winger will make a ‘great contribution’ to developing talent at the club.
Hopefully, Maloney can get the ball rolling and find a pathway for Celtic’s youngsters into the first team soon before the club lose any more talented players to the English Premier League.