Neil Lennon has admitted he lost some "good friends" over criticism of his second spell at Celtic.

The former Parkhead boss insisted some critics - including former team-mates and players - "should have known better" than to publically call him out.

Lennon was under severe pressure as Celtic manager as his side fell behind in the title race to Rangers with fan protests outside the stadium before his resignation.

But the former Hibs and Omonia Nicosia boss claims there were matters ongoing behind the scenes which impacted the club in the 2020/21 season.

A public spat had broken out after Andy Walker had questioned Celtic's trip to Dubai during the coronavirus pandemic while John Hartson was also slammed by Lennon in the midst of the heavy criticism.

Quizzed on whether he had lost friends through the challenging period, Lennon told PLZ Soccer: "Yeah, good friends as well who were reactionary and sort of adding to the fuel and jumping on the bandwagon when they should have known better and maybe taken a step back and go 'well, why is this really happening? It can't all be down to Lenny's coaching.'

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"And it certainly wasn't because there were a lot of things going on behind the scenes that were just out of your control as a coach.

"At the minute, I'm quite happy in my own skin with the group of friends that I have and I have many, many friends in football anyway.

"I was just really disappointed. Instead of them coming to me and talking about it first saying, 'Look I'm going to go this way Lenny, I hope you understand', I'd have been fine with that. It was disappointing rather than hurtful."

Asked if the criticism stung that bit more because it came from former friends and colleagues, Lennon added: "Yeah, of course. Been in the trenches with them and had all the successes not only as manager first time. When I came back, we'd won five out of five trophies. So it wasn't as if the whole spell was a complete disaster.

"And no one really sort of analysed and thought 'if it's Lenny, right let's have a look at if it's not Lenny, what else has been going on behind the scenes or what else is wrong with the players and why are they not performing?'

"As soon as the crowds went back, everything went back to normal again for Celtic."