Martin O’Neill feels the growing divide between many Celtic supporters and the club’s hierarchy is ‘sad’ – as he condemned the tennis ball protest against Dermot Desmond at St Andrews.

Appearing at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship at the Old Course last Saturday, the business leader’s round was interrupted on the 15th green when individuals associated with the Celtic Fans Collective launched balls towards him which had his face scored out.

In a lengthy statement, Celtic responded by saying they would indefinitely ban anyone who was involved in the stunt while immediately ceasing all engagement with the Collective.

Speaking on Friday after the Green Brigade – one of the groups that sits under the umbrella of the Collective – announced it would boycott all home Scottish Cup and Europa League matches, O’Neill drew a parallel between the St Andrews incident and the shameful scenes when his side won in the cup at Ibrox back in March.

‘I came into this situation this time last year and it seems to be going back to that again,’ he said.

‘I don’t agree at all with what happened up at St Andrews. I don’t agree with that at all. I think that it’s not Celtic.

Celtic boss Martin O’Neill is concerned about the club’s relationship with some supporters

Celtic’s majority shareholder Dermot Desmond had tennis balls thrown at him at St Andrews

‘I mean, we derided Rangers (fans) in the game for wearing balaclavas. And then suddenly we’re doing this stuff. This is not Celtic at all.

‘I think it’s a really sad situation if that’s the case. But we went through it last season.

‘What I will say is that when the club came together and it was really big … I can remember the days of having 80,000 people in Seville without an arrest, that’s Celtic to me.

‘Or the final whistle going in the last match of the season, where the crowd come onto the pitch and that’s like a euphoric state. Those are phenomenal memories which I’ll never forget.

‘But at the end of it all, it is a sad situation. All I do know is that when the club were together towards the end of the season, I genuinely felt we were unbeatable.’

With many supporters feeling disenchanted at the way Celtic is being run, demonstrations and anti-board chants have been commonplace at matches for some time.

Although O’Neill has resolved to try and concentrate only on matters on the pitch, he feels it’s naïve to believe that players aren’t affected by it.

‘I said last season when I came here, first of all, I wasn’t sure that it would have affected the likes of Daizen Maeda and people like this here,’ he added. ‘But I was wrong. Yes, it does. It affects the players. It definitely does.

‘We have to try and win some football matches in order to get some togetherness again. I think that’s what we have to do.’

O’Neill, meanwhile, says he’s fully committed to the club after taking a brief period to reflect at the start of the international break.

O’Neill believes it’s a sad situation that fans and the board struggle to unite at Celtic

On the back of three straight defeats – with two of them coming to Rangers – the 74-year-old revealed that he was going to review his position suggesting it might be time to ‘wrap it up’.

Explaining the process which led him to banish any thought of resigning from his mind, he said: ‘Well, it didn’t take that long, in all honesty, but it came at a time when there was an international break, gives you time to reflect, things like that.

‘Obviously, I was disappointed with the week that we had. There’s a long season ahead and it didn’t take me long to make my mind up to continue. As long as the football club wanted me, I was happy to do it.’

O’Neill was asked what the main motivation was in him wanting to get back on the training pitch.

‘I think the main driver was to try and win the league, again. That’s really it,’ he explained.

O’Neill takes his side to Motherwell on Sunday with a chance of including Jota in the match-day squad.

The Portuguese has been out with a cruciate ligament injury since April of last year but is now nearing a first-team return.

Alistair Johnston and Callum Osmand are also nearing their returns with Landon Emenalo set to start training with Celtic next week following his loan from Chelsea.

‘Jota’s been training a wee bit more than Alistair, which is really good. We had a bounce game against Falkirk, which was really good,’ he said.

‘These were non-international players, but at least he got some of that, which was encouraging. Alistair’s just making his way back, so we just want to be careful with him. And young Osmand is doing the same.’

Asked if Jota be involved at the weekend, O’Neill said: ‘There’s every possibility. He’s been training with us now for quite some considerable time. But that was the first time he’d played what I would call a semi-competitive game.’

Yang Hyun-jun is out with the hamstring injury he picked up while away with South Korea and Cameron Carter-Vickers is having a strain assessed.