Darren Bent has revealed that Celtic manager once rang him up to challenge him over comments he had made as a pundit.
The former England international, in an interview with Football Insider, suggested that he would rather play for Rangers manager Steven Gerrard.
And speaking on Soccer AM, Bent revealed that Lennon had then rang him up to challenge his comments.
He said: “There was one scenario, I was talking to this magazine Football Insider and I said something about Neil Lennon.
“I think the question was ‘who would you rather play for Celtic under Neil Lennon or Rangers with Steven Gerrard?’.
“I said, basically, Steven Gerrard, mainly because I know Steven Gerrard and he’s an up and coming manager, whereas Neil Lennon is old school.
“Obviously he didn’t like it cause he phoned me up. He just wanted me to clarify my comments.”
Darren Bent tells the story about the time Neil Lennon phoned him up to challenge his comments on being an 'old school manager' ?? pic.twitter.com/g6CB6EyhaT
— Soccer AM (@SoccerAM) September 7, 2019
Was Lennon right to call Bent?
You have to say that this doesn’t reflect too well on Lennon.
Obviously, nobody likes to be criticised, let alone in public, and in that respect, you can kind of understand why the Hoops’ boss made the call, literally, to talk to Bent about his comments.
That being said, Lennon is the manager of the biggest club in Scottish football at the moment, and if he can’t turn a blind eye to this kind of comment from a pundit, then you have to wonder if he has the right mentality for the job.
Rightly or wrongly, media scrutiny is a central facet of football management. You simply cannot afford to be having cosy chats with every pundit who speaks up against you, otherwise you’ll never get any management done.
Maybe Lennon felt it was beneficial to call Bent in the hope that he could iron out some misunderstandings with the pundit, so that next time he commented on Celtic, he would do so more favourably.
But honestly, Lennon should be able to let his results on the pitch do the propaganda work for him.
Mop up any and every piece of silverware on offer, show yourself to be forward-thinking and progressive, and make it so that the scrutiny is shifted onto Bent’s inaccurate comments.
It’s got to be better than ringing him up, surely.