FORMER Championship coach Johan Mjallby has swapped defensive arts for martial arts… by training as a Shaolin monk.
The Celtic legend won three SPL titles, two Scottish Cups and two League Cups in his six-year Hoops playing career.
He later spent the 2014-15 season at second-tier Bolton Wanderers as assistant to boss Neil Lennon.
Swedish ex-defender Mjallby previously worked for four years at Celtic under Northern Irishman Lennon.
The 54-year-old has now taken part in a reality show for Swedish TV station SVT named Shaolin Heroes.
He spent 12 days in a temple in the South Korean forest, learning Kung Fu as well as meditation rituals, alongside six other Swedish celebrities.
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And the former Parkhead favourite said the tough training left him “broken” at times.
SVT said: “Through rock-hard kung fu, meditation and ancient rituals, their bodies, willpower and self-images are tested to the breaking point.
“One is a narcissist, another is jealous, controlling or constantly angry. They all carry inner demons that cannot be escaped from when the body aches and silence takes over.”
Mjallby said: “I went as it felt like something that could benefit me a lot. Life is very much about personal development, and here I saw a chance to do that.
“I’m certainly not a narcissist or jealous. On the other hand I get stressed when I have to wait, so my concern is a lack of patience.
“I hoped to learn things, to make an inner journey. It wasn’t a competition, but rather about picking things up and developing.
“I didn’t go into it because I had wounds to heal. I don’t think I am a bad person.
“But I’m aware I have had a bit of a lack of empathy. Maybe that’s how you are when you are an elite athlete.
“Sometimes you focus very much on yourself – you have the blinkers on and don’t see those around you.
“I thought maybe we would train twice a day, but after many days of hard work you were actually broken.
“I thought I had trained hard in my life, but this was damn hard both physically and mentally. It was a pretty tough mental journey.
“It was tough to spend quite a few days in a fantastic, but isolated place. We were totally isolated from the outside world, without computers or phones.
“It was a bit ascetic and quite cool, but of course mentally it was a test.
“I had never met the others before. Now I think that, for the rest of my life, I will try to help if someone else asks me for help.
“It was an incredibly cool experience, a privilege to be part of – and a memory for life.”
Shaolin Heroes will debut on SVT on January 2.
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