​“It’s just not a great situation to be in,” Martin O’Neill on away fan banMartin O’Neill spoke to the mainstream media at Lennoxtown this afternoon ahead of tomorrow’s Scottish Premiership fixture away to St Mirren…Martin O’Neill, Manager of Celtic, looks on before the Scottish Premiership match between Celtic and Aberdeen at Celtic Park on September 02, 2026 . (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)A reminder that the Celtic fan media remains banned by the club pending a fabled review that never happened…8th March 2026; Ibrox; Scottish Cup, Rangers versus Celtic; Celtic fans fill the Broomloan stand. Photo Vagelis GeorgariouQ: Martin, can we get your take on the announcement from the last few minutes? That there will be no Celtic vs Rangers visiting fans for the derby fixture this season?Martin O’Neill:“I think that was inevitable, really, after Rangers were offering 300 tickets, and I think we refused that. And I think it was just inevitable that that’s the decision that the powers that be would make, eventually, or make for them. Really sad, I must admit, from a normal punter’s viewpoint. It’s still a great fixture. I’ve said this on a few times. I still looked forward to it when I wasn’t involved. Yeah, really sad.”Scottish Cup, Rangers versus Celtic; Celtic fans huddle. 8th March 2026. Photo Vagelis GeorgariouQ: You’ve always said you want away fans at both grounds, do you think we’ve now got to a point that there may never be?Martin O’Neill: “Hopefully that won’t happen at some stage or another. Maybe we might all see some sort of sense and see that this particular fixture, which is one of the greats in European football, if not the world, honestly. I keep saying this regardless of the calibre of the teams playing in the game. It’s a great, great fixture, and it loses a great deal with the big allocation of away fans not being in the stadium. So really, yeah, really disappointing, but we’ll see what develops over this season.”8th March 2026; Ibrox; Scottish CupRangers versus Celtic; Celtic supporters celebrating. Photo Vagelis GeorgariouQ: Martin, given your first answer when you said that Rangers only offered 300, do you think the situation is avoidable then?Martin O’Neill: “If that was the case, then I think there was an inevitability that we would just say, well, what’s the point of having 300 tickets?”Q: How do you think it gets resolved?Martin O’Neill:  “Gosh, how will it get resolved? I think hopefully the two clubs will maybe get together at some stage or another and try and iron out particular problems. I mean, it’s not to say that we haven’t had a few problems in the past, but they seem to have escalated over the last number of seasons, which is a problem.”8th March 2026; Ibrox; Scottish Cup Football, Rangers versus Celtic; Celtic fans celebrate. Photo Vagelis GeorgariouQ: Do you think there’s any reason, we were just discussing it there, it does seem like it’s e