Breakdown of a Parkhead breakdown: The FIVE key points Wilfried Nancy wants to deal with at Celtic if he’s going to persuade anybody he is the best man for the job

Having presided over the worst start of any manager in Celtic’s history, Wilfried Nancy is already under huge pressure despite only being three games into his tenure.

Defeats to Hearts and Roma ensured that he was under intense scrutiny right from the off — before Celtic then lost to St Mirren in the Premier Sports Cup final last Sunday.

There are a growing number of supporters who already believe the club have made a huge mistake and that Nancy won’t even make it to the end of the season.

Indeed, after Martin O’Neill admitted earlier this week that he would have stayed on had he been asked, some fans are even calling for Nancy to be sacked immediately and for the 73-year-old icon to be brought back.

Nancy will take his team to Tannadice to face Dundee United tonight — and boldly declared yesterday that he has ‘nothing to prove’.

Celtic will then face Aberdeen at home on Sunday, before games against Livingston (away), Motherwell (away) and Rangers (home) over the festive period.

It would be a tricky run of fixtures even at the best of times. All the more so with a new manager still seeking to convince people that he’s the right man for the job.

Here, Daily Mail Sport’s Calum Crowe takes a look at five key issues facing Nancy as he bids to turn things around.

GET THE PLAYERS ONSIDE

There are already murmurs coming from within the Celtic camp that the players are not fully sold on Nancy. Unimpressed by his methods, they don’t look like they are completely onboard with what he’s asking them to do.

They are unhappy at the way in which he has completely ripped everything up mid-season and sought to change the system after O’Neill had simplified things and restored confidence.

Watching them against St Mirren at Hampden, the players fundamentally did not look like they understood what was being asked of them. It was also telling after full-time that Nancy barely spoke to any of the players, instead leaving goalkeeping coach Stevie Woods to go round and try and lift their spirits.

Nancy needs to recognise the importance of getting the senior players onside. If he doesn’t, and he makes the same mistakes that Russell Martin and Paul Le Guen made at Rangers, then Celtic will be looking for a new manager before the January sales have even started.

REVERT TO A BACK FOUR

During his time in the MLS, Nancy developed a reputation as an attack-minded coach who deployed his team in a 3-4-3 formation.

Even if he had taken over during the summer and had a full pre-season under his belt, making such a radical change to Celtic’s system and style of play would have been difficult. Doing it mid-season is nigh-on impossible. Especially with the personnel available to him. Celtic simply don’t have the players to play Nancy’s 3-4-3. More often than not, it’s square pegs in round holes.

The manager has already claimed that his tactics are not the problem, but that just doesn’t match the reality of what’s happening on the pitch. The fact that he is determined to stick with the same system even though it’s clearly not working does not make him principled. It makes him naive and stupid.

Good managers assess what they have available to them and set the team up accordingly. They prepare the team in a certain shape to give them every possible chance of success.

Nancy needs to ditch the back three, even if only until January when he can make some new signings. Sticking with it is a guaranteed route to failure.

IT’S TIME TO DROP KASPER SCHMEICHEL

Schmeichel’s decline can be traced all the way back to last season’s Scottish Cup final against Aberdeen. It was his mistake that allowed the Dons to equalise and force the match into extra-time. His form has not recovered since then.

The decline has been stark. Even going back to earlier this season when Brendan Rodgers was in charge, he was making mistakes. His distribution was routinely putting Celtic under pressure — and that has continued into the Nancy era.

Schmeichel was at fault for St Mirren’s second goal at Hampden, coming off his line but getting caught in no man’s land as Jonah Ayunga had the simple task of heading the ball into an empty net.

The Danish goalkeeper has turned into a liability for Celtic. His physical condition also leaves a lot to be desired for a professional footballer.

When Viljami Sinisalo played towards the end of last season, he looked good. Indeed, he was unlucky that Schmeichel came back into the team and took his place for the cup final.

Schmeichel is not performing well enough to deserve his place in the team. Sinisalo deserves a chance.

BETTER COMMUNICATION

You have to cut Nancy some slack in the sense that English is not his first language. But there have already been a few statements from the Frenchman which go beyond any translation issues.

The latest came yesterday when he claimed: ‘I don’t have anything to prove for anybody. Simple as that.’

That was a ridiculous thing to say. As an unknown quantity coming in from the MLS to take his first managerial gig in Europe, he has everything to prove.

He also raised more than a few eyebrows after the 2-1 defeat to Hearts when he said: ‘I am not about winning or losing. I am about having a good performance.’ It was like listening to Russell Martin all over again. It was an incredibly naive thing to say.

The refusal to acknowledge any issues with his tactics was also pretty alarming. Much of what Nancy says comes across as ideological gobbledygook. If that’s how it sounds to outsiders, how must it sound to the players?

SORT THE DEFENCE

Celtic have conceded four headers in three matches under Nancy. They cannot defend set-pieces.

In fairness, that’s been a long-standing problem. But Nancy has shown nothing in the way of being able to fix it. If anything, they have looked even more vulnerable under his watch.

There was almost a feeling of inevitability when St Mirren skipper Marcus Fraser rose to head in the opening goal from a corner on Sunday after only a couple of minutes.

With so many tough fixtures to come over the next fortnight, and with a team clearly still searching for its identity, Nancy would be wise to try and establish some kind of solid defensive platform from which to build.