“It’s completely the right decision,” he said.

“When he first arrived at the club, they were put out of the Champions League right away.

“He had another disastrous one against Clyde but he has won two trophies out of three in his first season and not many managers do that.

“It was a very poor result against Artmedia Bratislava but that was always going to be a big struggle for him.

“But after that he won the league and won it by a long way so you need to give him great credit because no other manager could have done any better than Gordon this season.

“You had to give him manager of the year because he has Celtic playing attractive football again.

“He’s never been a winner as a manager so this will give him incredible confidence to go on.

“People say the league is not that tough but you have to still beat the teams that are in front of you.

“There is no doubt he should have won this. People will argue about it but he has won two trophies so end of story.”

It had been suggested Strachan’s personality and sometimes strained relationship with the media would influence the voting of some scribes.

But McGarvey believes Jefferies was right to get second place behind the successful Hoops boss after guiding his side to fifth in the table with limited resources.

“Jim Jefferies has done well but he’s not won anything,” he said.

“It’s very hard for him but you can’t take anything away from what he has done, because he has no money.”