Interim Hearts boss Jon Daly has dubbed comments made by Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers "farcical" and believes the Northern Irishman would not have dreamt of talking about the structure at clubs such as Chelsea and Manchester United when he was in charge at Liverpool.
Ahead of Celtic's 4-1 win over Hearts on Saturday, Rodgers expressed his sympathy for Ian Cathro, recently sacked by the Jambos, and suggested the players were signed by someone else and not suited to the way he wanted to play at Tynecastle.
Rodgers dubbed the set-up "confused" and suggested the players at Cathro's disposal were ill suited to the type of game the manager wanted to play.
For Daly, Rodgers overstepped the mark by talking about Hearts' structure, which includes a director of football in Craig Levein, and believes he would never have dreamt of making the same comments south of the border.
"I can understand the comments made about a manager losing his job because I'd be the very same. It's never nice to see someone lose their job but to comment on the recruitment of the players, to say that they don't fit the system, it's poor for me", Daly told BBC Scotland.
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"You look at the players we've brought in – Michael Smith, he's a wing-back; Ash Smith-Brown, wing-back; [Rafal] Grzelak, wing-back; [Kyle] Lafferty, striker; [Isma] Goncalves, last year to play on the left-hand side of a front three; [Christophe] Berra to play in a back three.
"For him to come out and make a comment like that, it's just farcical, to be honest.
"I've followed Brendan's career for a long, long time. I've got a lot of admiration for him and I've never heard him make a comment like that when he was at Liverpool, commenting on Man United's structure or Chelsea's structure or Man City's structure", he added.
And Daly believes that the fact Rodgers is at Celtic, the biggest club in the Scottish Premiership, means he thinks he has the right to pass judgement on the way other clubs are operating.
"He's obviously come up to Scotland and think he's the biggest fish in the biggest pond, with the best squad, with the best budget and he thinks he can comment on other people's teams, other people's structures or clubs and it's unacceptable.
"He wouldn't have done it in the Premiership [in England] so I don't see why now he all of a sudden thinks he can start doing it", Daly added.
On the pitch, goals from Leigh Griffiths (29th and 63rd minutes), Scott Sinclair (51st minute) and Callum McGregor (73rd minute) proved too much for Hearts to handle.
