{"id":390680,"date":"2026-01-06T07:25:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T07:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/390680\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T07:25:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T07:25:10","slug":"martin-oneill-returns-as-celtic-manager-wilfried-nancy-sacked-after-33-days-in-charge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/390680\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin O\u2019Neill returns as Celtic manager, Wilfried Nancy sacked after 33 days in charge"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Martin O\u2019Neill has returned to Celtic for a second time this season after the exit of Wilfried Nancy.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6859226\/2025\/12\/03\/celtic-wilfried-nancy-manager\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Nancy was appointed<\/a> on a two-and-a-half-year deal by the Scottish champions on December 3, joining from MLS side Columbus Crew, but lost six of his eight games in charge and was dismissed after just 33 days at the Glasgow club.<\/p>\n<p>That means the 48-year-old has had the shortest stint of any permanent manager in the club\u2019s history \u2014 previously the eight months of John Barnes in the 1999-00 season \u2014and he was in charge for four days fewer than interim coach O\u2019Neill, whom he succeeded in December.<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Neill, who previously won seven trophies at Celtic as manager between 2000 and 2005, oversaw seven wins from eight games in charge prior to the permanent appointment of Nancy.<\/p>\n<p>The Northern Irishman, who will assume the role for the remainder of the campaign, is joined by Shaun Maloney and Mark Fotheringham as his assistants, as well as Stephen McManus. All three previously played under O\u2019neill during his first stint at the Glasgow club.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Manager Update<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Celtic Football Club (@CelticFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CelticFC\/status\/2008257692696244591?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">January 5, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Frenchman oversaw league defeats at home to Hearts and away to Dundee United, alongside a three-goal home loss to Roma in the Europa League and a 3-1 defeat by St Mirren in the Scottish League Cup final.<\/p>\n<p>After two wins, against Aberdeen and Livingston, Celtic lost 2-0 to Motherwell on Tuesday before losing his first Old Firm on Saturday. The 3-1 home defeat against Rangers turned out to be his final match in charge.<\/p>\n<p>The club have also confirmed the exit of Paul Tisdale, who was head of football operations, alongside Nancy\u2019s staff members Kwame Ampadu, Jules Gueguen, and Maxime Chalier.<\/p>\n<p>Celtic have had a turbulent campaign, with Brendan Rodgers resigning as head coach on October 27 and initially being replaced by O\u2019Neill on an interim basis.<\/p>\n<p>Nancy previously enjoyed a successful tenure with Columbus, winning the 2023 MLS Cup and 2024 Leagues Cup and leading the team to the final of the 2024 CONCACAF Champions Cup.<\/p>\n<p>The last Scottish team outside of Celtic and Rangers to win the nation\u2019s top division was Aberdeen, managed by Sir Alex Ferguson, in 1984-85. Hearts currently are six points clear of both Celtic and Rangers, who are level on points and goal difference, at the top of the standings.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Martin O\u2019Neill has returned to Celtic for a second time this season after the exit of Wilfried Nancy.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":390681,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[8919,30056,6090,9523,9121,40481,403,99],"class_list":["post-390680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-celtic","tag-columbus-crew","tag-international-football","tag-mls","tag-scotland","tag-scottish-premiership","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}