About those absurd Neil Lennon to Villa rumours

Neil Lennon is moving on after four seasons at Celtic. His time as manager of his former club was quite successful, but you could hardly expect otherwise given the lack of competition in the Scottish Premier League. Now that he's ready to move on to different pastures, there will inevitably be a flurry of rumours about where he will go. The Northern Irishman may be the next hot managerial commodity, and with as much uncertainty as there is right now at Aston Villa, the two will inevitably be linked. 

In fact, it's already happened. The Express have made a list of places we are most likely to see Lennon land at next, and Aston Villa make an appearance. Their reasoning is that new owners may be able to convince Lennon in with the challenge of reviving a once-great club. Oddly, there is no mention of Stiliyan Petrov, with whom Lennon played at Celtic between 2000 and 2006. You'd think they would find anything when they're grasping at straws. 

So let's kill this rumour before it has the chance to get started. As it currently stands, there is no way that Lennon ends up at Villa, and there is no reason to believe that the situation will change enough to allow for it any time soon. Randy Lerner has expressed a desire to stay with Paul Lambert as manager and doesn't seem to have a buyer lined up for the club. While Lerner is still in charge, we can expect to see Lambert around. 

But what if we get new owners? Well yes, at that point they could fire Lambert and they could hire Lennon. But that's quite the long chain of conditionals we're relying on there. If the club gets new owners soon, and if they fire Paul Lambert they could seek the services on Neil Lennon. There is plenty of baseless speculation in the transfer window, but it generally only relies on a "could," and not one preceded by two "ifs." 

I know it's not serious yet, but let's all keep our heads about us and not bite on this one. Within the realm of logical possibility, there is no way Lennon is Aston Villa's next manager right now. If things change, we can reassess. Until then, let's bury this idea.