NEIL LENNON has called former Republic of Ireland defender Gary Breen’s comments on Shane Duffy risking his international career by signing for Celtic ‘embarrassing’.

Breen made the remarks on radio on Sunday, the same day that Duffy made a scoring debut for Celtic at Ross County, suggesting that sloppiness and ‘bad habits’ would creep into Duffy’s game as the calibre of player he was up against every week was of such a poor standard.

But Lennon has hit back at what he deems as Breen's ignorant assessment of the Scottish game, citing the success of several former Celtic players in the English Premier League as evidence of the quality that exists in the Scottish Premiership.

“He’s just the latest in a long list of people who’ve made comments about the game up here which have been totally wrong,” Lennon said.

“I don’t want to dwell too long on his comments but I obviously disagree with them. I think this is a great move for Shane; it’ll be good for his profile, good for his international status and he has an international manager who worked in Scotland and who know the pressures which come with playing for Celtic.

“Gary needs to educate himself better before he starts coming out with these sweeping generalisations about the Scottish game. There are a lot of big players in the Premier League down south who came from this division.

“Kieran Tierney and Virgil Van Dijk have done all right for themselves and we still have some good players up here – look at Kristoffer Ajer, Christopher Jullien, Greg Taylor and Hatem Elhamed.

“They’re all top players at a great stage in their career with a huge club.

“So, I think Gary has it totally wrong, he’s completely misread the situation and it’s a bit embarrassing for him, really.”