 Monday, June 06, 2005
Desmonds outburst and risk of a Glazer style takeover at Celtic
After a long hard season we could all have done without Dermot Desmonds introspective on Friday, though he said little different than I had said myself back in April.
As with most things Celtic, minor details tend to obscure the big picture, and there is an unpleasant big picture lurking behind this story.
Whether Celtic move to the Premiership or not, sooner or later Dermot Desmond will sell his shares and pass control of the club onto a new owner.
If we stay in Scotland £40million might be enough to buy Celtic, in England the fee will be several times this. Either way there is no chance a large portion of his shares will be bought by small, Celtic supporting, shareholders.
Celtic will either have to find a new sugar daddy, a prospect I find risible, or it will pass into the hands of an investor will a commercial return to take care of.
There are essentially two types of commercial investors, and the recent history of Manchester United illustrates both.
Cubic Expression, together with several institutional shareholders were satisfied to allow Manchester United to tick along returning profits of around 10-15% of turnover, when the business could easily be more profitable. Trouble is, in the commercial world this kind of arrangement will never last very long at a club like Manchester United or Celtic. Inevitably someone will come along and flood the shareholders with so much cash they will sell.
Glazer will now embark on a programme to maximise his return, which will certainly mean brining in new revenues, but will also mean allocating a much greater portion of revenues towards dividends. Unfortunately for United fans they will soon be bought out of their club – no longer shareholders, just customers.
Celtics turnover is circa £70million with current costs slightly more than this each year. It would not take a financier of Glazers standing to raise the £40million (or more if we are in England) and buy Dermot Desmonds shares.
We are vulnerable to a small-time corporate raider.
If I was the corporate raider and Celtic was not the victim, I would sell players who had a high transfer value and build a low cost team– not unlike Rangers have been doing recently.
I would cap expenditure at £40million a year, and look to clear over £20million annually for myself. I might even sell and lease back Celtic Park to help me clear my debts.
It is that easy to make serious money out of Celtic, just watch David Murray do something similar at Rangers over the next few years.
Under these circumstances I am sure Brian Quinn would tell me where to stick the £15,000 per annum he gets to chair the board. No worry, I would have enough cash to hire a PR-friendly telephone-wise chairman to sell my spin to the fans.
The only person capable of delaying this inevitable slide towards soulless commercialism is Dermot Desmond. If he wants to get as much money as possible for his shares, he will sell to someone with the same financial objectives as Malcolm Glazer.
The chances of attracting someone with substantial wealth who will allow Celtic to run at a loss for six consecutive years as Desmond himself has done is remote. Few of these people would put up with the hassle or media interest that comes from owning Celtic.
The best scenario we can hope for is that Desmond finds someone to sell to in much the same way Fergus did. Someone he can trust not to exploit the club for every penny possible.
Desmonds succession is the most serious threat to the future of Celtic Football Club.
That Dermot Desmond does not read this kind of discussion in Scottish newspapers is not an act of bias; it is a result of ignorance of the facts. Celtic could do so much better at getting their message across. David Murray does, I even find Celtic fans tell me how generous he has been to Rangers recently (see if I need to explain to one more Celtic fan the story of the £50million….).
As such, Desmond was wrong to publicly criticise supporters as he done last week. As regular readers will know, I argue this point here with all comers, but I seldom find a Celtic fan wilfully misleading anyone. That Quinn was booed was as much a result of poor communication from Celtic as bad manners.
The media owe Celtic nothing and we should not look for them to do our work for us. I do though, care little for the quisling Celtic fans in the media who on the one hand readily admit that finance is not their strong point, but still harangue our club on the subject with the objective of selling the tat they call advertising.
When you are in a position to influence opinion, ignorance of the facts is not a green light to harm Celtic.
241 Comments:
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I'm all worried now, really hope this wont happen. I'm away for a drink to console myself.
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Hi Paul, dont get mad, but can you tell me the story of the 50 million? did it go somewhere ppl dont know about?
Ped
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I don't think anyone here has a spare £40m, so we should all be listening when DD talks. There's no real answer to the question you raise here Paul.
As I've said before. Bring on the EPL, I'll be happy to see our scottish hacks try to keep up, and try to keep in a job.
A small point regarding people with influence. I was listening to Off The Ball the other week, Tam "I laugh at all my own jokes ,me" Cowan was saying how well behaved all the fans were at Motherwell on the last day of the season. He then says that Celtic fans beat up some bloke in a wheelchair. I don't want to condone violence in any form, but if that were Gorgeous George Galloway, we'd find Messers Cowan and Lekkie in the dock facing slander charges (or is it still libel in the broadcast media?).
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Paul,
If some of DD customers who frequent his 5 star resorts complained about the decline in standards, would DD publically crtiicise those high rollers in the same fashion? I think not. He has shown his utter contempt for the people who actually pay the bills at CP. I didn't boo Brian Quinn, though I understood the reasons behind people who did. Our very own Dr Doom couldn't have picked a worse time to put himself forward to receive a presentation on behalf of the fans/club. Timing is everything. His comments are a disgrace and I liked the way the offical website was quickly changed to Desmonds Disappointment. Ha! What a surprise that this has come out after the renewal deadline has passed. DD has certainly managed to put a halt to the positive stories that had been prevalent of late.
Yes we need his money but to say he isn't in it to make money is a tad naive. Is it possible he bought out Fergus' shares and has since been unable to make the kind of profit he'd be looking for? Maybe I'm selling his 'emotional attachement' short I don't know the man afterall. I'd be interested to know just how much he has put in and how much he's got out through dividends. Do you know Paul?
Anyway, I daresay going by the posts on here the other day that I am in the minority on this site. I thought his comments were a joke and whilst I agreed with dismay about the booing I can't believe he thought it'd be the right time to come out and launch a tirade against us.
Incidently Paul, DD doesn't own the club. You mention 'owner' several times, he is NOT the owner of Celtic PLC. Though judging by his behaviour he thinks he is.
qmark
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Paul,
a couple of questions. How much have Celtic paid out in dividends since Dermot took over? Would we have made a loss if these weren't paid? Does Dermot expect to make income on his shares? How much exactly is Quinn paid for his job? I also think Quinn is disliked for his arrogant attitude shown towards supporters at the AGM, this is as much part of the reason he was booed as anything. They think it is their club and we have no right to question them. Dermot obviously thinks it bad manners to boo Mr Quinn yet doesn't think it's bad manners not to show up at the AGM. I think this article is bit pro the board but you maybe have more information than i do as to what goes on behing the scenes.
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We may have to rely on DD's word that he is a fan of Celtic. Any fan of Celtic would not sell out to a small-time corporate raider. Paul, if you are able to identify the pitfalls then DD will be able too. Him being the "real" fan he says he is should prevent him from railroading Celtic down this route. You, me, my mate Barrie... every Celtic fan would not appreciate this option and I doubt DD will too.
DD has, for ever and a day, talked about moving south to the EPL. I hope, and suspect, that he will wait until this either happens or is a dead duck in the water before deciding the what he will do next.
We need to trust DD's judgment and him having Celtic's interests at heart. He is a fan after all...
TinneyBhoy
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The very fact that Desmond would want to sell his shares surely proves that he is not , as I suspect, a born & bred Tim.
If he had thought about it and realised that the MAJORITY of people who go to CP hand over a far higher percentage of their income to the club than he does - he should have took the proverbial "fifth".
Paul, your "well he's the best of a bad bunch" defence of Desmond is rather strange.
As I have said in previous posts, when messrs Magnier & McManus invest their cash (no doubt after a hard slog on some Carribean golf course owned by DD)we then move to the EPL . We will become another corporation to compete with Man Utd Plc. We will be no different to the Tesco/Asda/Sainsbury/Morrissons supermarket battles , except we will probably be the equivalent of Kwik Save or whatever. Do you think when the Coolmore mafia are counting their cash after selling on there will be any sense of regret or even a tinge of sentimentality ?
Of course not.
It seems to me that a move to England may put this club finally out of reach of the "ordinary" supporters. A level of dissafection which will surpass the 1990's. However, to stay in Scotland seems unacceptable too.
I guess it's a case of be careul what you wish for.
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I think we are all missing the point on why Quinn was booed. We were in the run in to the end of the season trying to win the league and we were 2-0 down to Hearts? if we had been 2-0 up against hearts he would have received a hearty cheer and a wee chorus of "one Vila-real".
However, for Desmond to react the way he did is quite unbelievable, he was at least petulant and could be described as childish "shout at my pal again and I'll take my ball/money away".
He is no mug, nor is he petulant or childish, he is working his exit strategy and I fear Paul that your predications of Dermot leading us to the promised land may very well be flawed.
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I don't agree with DD's comments either but I also don't go along with the idea that he is 'working his exit strategy'. If he decides to go he will go and won't bother making excuses to do it either.
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Ped, I’ll dig out the article and post a link later.
Qmark, DD has effective control and is likely to have complete ownership there for the taking if he wants it in 2007.
Northstand 404, don’t confuse your personal feelings for the board with the reality that Celtic can be sold for a lot of money to a Glazer type. Celtic are now a commercial vehicle and this is all just a matter of time as far as I am concerned. The longer we delay the better.
And, yes, we would still have lost lots if we did not pay dividends.
Tinneybhoy, I agree with you on this one.
San Miguel, we need to face the reality that Celtic is not a workers cooperative. Like it or not it is a commercial company and we need to bring the right kind of pressure on our board.
DD might not want to sell his shares, but unless he knows the trick to eternal life he will make an exit on day. If he is looking out for the interests of Celtic he will plan how to make his exit.
Anon 12.47, I think worrying about the rights and wrongs of booing is missing the point. Look at the big picture and look at the sentiment between fans and major shareholder, then tell me what we should be worrying about.
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I haven’t posted for months, but I’ve been following the discussions avidly.
Part of the PR problem was Martin O’Neill’s periodic announcements that he needed “4 or 5 new players”, and then when he was given money he proceeded to throw it at his existing squad.
This management style brought a great deal of success, and it was only this season that the cracks showed. However Martin could have been more honest about what he was doing. The board were forced to take the flak about being tight-fisted, when there was plenty of money being spent. The board were either too polite or too scared to criticise Martin, and the frustration this caused is evident in the notorious Quinn voice-mail.
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Paul,
Maybe I am missing something here, but the link between the fans and board will never be great no matter who is in charge. Most supporters have no concept of business management and what the board even do, they will always see them as the guys who "don't spend money". I suppose we could go down a Murray route and spin everything and get a better PR, but we would see through that eventually. I also think its fair to say that Celtic are probably the most "political" club in football with a lot of fans who have a politic background of one sort or another.
What should we be worrying about? we should be focusing as a club on the business problems and I believe the biggest is that we are paying way over the odds for certain players and should move them on and stop being the sentimental fools we are. One thing (the only thing) that always impressed me about SOuness at Rangers was how ruthless he was on the transfer market, as soon as they looked like getting over the hill, out they went and for a fee.
As for DD, what other reason could he have for his statements, this guy is cynical and does nothing without a reason.
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Does anyone know the extent of DD investment in Celtic? Compared to the amount he's been paid through dividends? Paul if you know I'd love it if you could share that with us.
As for looking for more investment from the fans. What? Like the reinvest the dividends plan that was rejected out of hand? Hmmm, can't imagine why that was.
qmark.
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Hi Paul,
If you rise to the prospect, would you post under the mask of SugarDaddy67?
Our good amigo Fargo could give you some tips on alternative handles.
Have a great day, cheeky one.
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Sorry to go on about transfer targets again, but after my post of a couple of days ago the situation has changed. With both Riordan and Hartley allegedly being available for £0.5M each, and with this assumed budget of £10M, we could now do the following:
Paddy Kenny (Sheff Utd GK), 27 years old, for £1.5M
Derek Riordan (Hibs) 22, for £0.5M
Paul Hartley (Hearts) 28, £0.5M
Tommy Miller (Ipswich) 26, for £1M
Bellamy (25), 1 yr loan for £1M
CSKA left back (22) for £2M
So we get three good international attacking midfielders, a decent international goallie, a top notch international striker, and a very promising (UEFA Cup winning!) international left back, and all for £6.5M. And what's more, they have an average age of 25 years.
It still leaves £3.5M for a couple of good solid centre backs.
So that's 8 international players (1 GK, 3 defenders, 3 midfielders & a striker), all with their best years still to come, for £10M.
Oh, and add Robbie Keane on a pre-contract to pick him up on a Bosman at the end of next season to replace Bellamy when he returns to Newcastle after Souness has been given the boot.
It's not rocket science!
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Paul, I've been reading the site for some time now and have generally been impressed, although I have to say recently the tone appears to be moving toward a PR spin for the board and our "esteemed" friend Mr Desmond.
Dermot Desmond is a wealthy and successful businessman, who is a major shareholder and board member in Celtic - no more, no less. He invested primarily to make money, as did his friends Messrs McManus and Magnier at Manchester United, not through any great love for the club. He does not own Celtic Football Club, and should be reminded of that when he chooses to patronise those fans who have invested much more financially, pro-rata, and emotionally into the club than he ever has. For the official website to allow him to comment on such a manner on the Celtic support is a disgrace. Not all shareholders are allowed to speak through the club officially therefore why should he. He showed his contempt for the support previously when he left the AGM halfway through , because of a prior appointment, perhaps he should have his PA check his diary for next year should he have something else to say. I am sure should he not be sitting on a huge paper loss on his shares then he would have sold up by now.
He speaks of divisive forces at work and then feeds the tabloids this story.
Sell up Dermot, if we upset you so much, or are you waiting to make some more cash like your Coolmore Mafia friends ?
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Given that DD responded to the booing incident almost 2 months after the event, we can be sure that it was a considered and measured statement and not the reaction of someone in a petulant mood because one of his mates got booed. I totally agreed with his statement. BQ is one of the people who brought a level of credibility and business acumen to the running of the club – which had been a running joke for as long as I can remember. If I was BQ, I wouldn’t bother sticking around.
As regards the remarks that DD is not a dyed in the wool Celtic man I think is irrelevant. We are where we are because the dyed in the wool Celtic men could not run a whelk stall never mind a football club of the stature of Celtic. Not only did they lack strategic vision, they did not have any money to invest in the club and drove the club to edge of bankruptcy. As Paul has stated on numerous occasions, Celtic have spent around £40m more than they earned in the last 5 years. How many business men, regardless of how wealthy would be prepared to accept this level of ongoing loss?
DD has built on the foundations laid by Fergus and he may well cash in at some point in the future. That is life. If the club ends up in the hands of a Glazer type figure, then it will be down to us for not investing in the clubs shares and achieve the level required to collectively block any such schemes.
Tim_Bhoy
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See if I hear or read another thing about the Celtic Board,DD or who ever and its “ Aye but they waited till after the season ticket deadline “
I am going to hand back my season ticket !
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Rhinocardiff, to accuse me of spinning for the board is unworthy and only serves to take attention from the danger.
As Tim Bhoy has just said, in the last six years the club have run up a £40million loss. If he chooses he could cut our annual expenditure to £40million from now on and make tens of millions per year.
Like it or not, hate him, love him, the budget decision is in his power.
Like is or not, who he sells up to is in his gift. Glazer or one of us.
Repeat ten times:
Dermot Desmonds is the only person who can stop Celtic being owned by a small time Glazer who will clear £20million a year from Celtic.
Then read his interview again.
Then try to stop yourself saying a ‘Glory Be’.
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First, I'll repeat what I said on a previous thread: Mr Desmond is not a stupid man. There is a reason for the public nature of his comments that were always going to be portrayed as inflammatory. We'll find his reasons in due course.
Second, and with due respect Paul, I think its fanciful to think better communication with the media will alter the way Celtic are reported.
You are spot on your assertions that the raison d etre of the media is to sell advertising.
Let's take this one step further. In order to sell advertising, the media outlet, whether that be a newspaper, radio programme or TV show, has to offer the advertiser readers, listeners and viewers.
This means they will target a certain demographic and form a view/opinion/stereotype of who their audience is.
So the Daily Record, for example, will have a stereotype of the average Rangers fan (a bigoted, working class, hun)that goes along to Ibrox every other week.
Similarly, they will also have a stereotype of what THEY BELIEVE is your average Celtic fan (working class, RC, pro-republican). Lo'and behold, your average Celtic fan is everything the bigoted hun despises.
Given the average Celtic fan is a significant minority in this country, and it's their job to deliver the largest audience to the advertiser, does it pay them to pander to the bigot or the Celtic fan?? We all know the answer to that one.
In my opinion that is why Celtic will never get a fair hearing in most of the traditional media. Our country is bigoted to the core and the business models of The Record, Sun, People etc. are set up to exploit this.
Yes, without doubt, the Club must improve communication. But they need to be innovative and do so in such a way that it can bye-pass the traditional media and get to the support directly.
All the best.
GM
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First time poster - got to say there are a lot of assumptions going on from posters here. Does anyone know for sure why D Desmond bought his shares? Everyone seems to think he has no emotional attachment to the club and is just in it for the money. Is there any hard evidence to support this or have some people just 'decided' that this is how it is.
Also - I have to mention this 'pro rata' argument - Celtic is a PLC guys - its no longer irish immigrants (like my grandpa - before I get knocked for having no history) kicking a bladder around for the sake of the community - I know the history but all the emotion surrounding D.Ds salary vs fans salary and the pro rata investment they make is emotional gusts. Live in the real world - I dont pro rata get a fridge cheaper at curries or a pint cheaper in my local because I have a 'low wage' likewise guys on the bru dont get these breaks either. If you won a million squid would you buy a house and make sure your kids and folks are ok or buy celtic a player? D.Ds made his cash just because he's a director doesnt mean he should put it all into the team.
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Qmark - in case you missed it Quinn was making a presentation on behalf of the club. In being disrespectful to Quinn we were being disrespectful to the 100 or so Villareal fans who travelled from Spain.
Big Chips UK - I am now seriously depressed. If your list is the level of our ambition then god help us.
Paul 67 - No matter how hard you try (and I relly want to believe) you'll never convince me and many others that the EPL is a realistic proposition in my lifetime.
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Seems I am in a minority, but I agreed with most of what DD said. The booing of Brian Quinn by "support" ers embarrasses the club and real supporters. It reminded me of the booing of Fergus while unfurling the championship flag - some of those boo boys have in hindsight admitted their shame.
On the day of the Hearts game, the criticisms of players, manager, board and chairmen around me were loud and loutish. My son (11) was confused as to why celtic supporters were abusing their own club.
To those who say "I pay for my ticket and I'll boo if I want", you are akin to a smoker in a restaurant polluting the air for others, including children who are learning about our great club. Let's support it in every possible way.
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It also annoyed me when the fans booed BG. The fans also booed ‘The Bunnet’ when he unveiled the flag. Why? A lot of fans do not like the people in power at Parkhead. In all my time as a supporter, they have never liked the Kellys, Whites, Fergus and now it is the turn of DD/BQ.
We will only realise that this is the best board we have ever had when they are gone. This board (and MON) has bought players I never thought would come to Celtic and stay. The board has sold the Celtic family to the players (and money helps too) to make them want to come & stay.
How many players want to leave Celtic these days whereas before they came and went the following season because they had a "wee problem". Now when they stay we say they are too old, not playing well etc they should go. We are a fickle lot.
If my comments about the board are wrong then please convince me otherwise - No "You are talking rubbish please".
StevieD
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Paul, just a quickie - am I being too cynical or could Desmond have released this stamement to create an air of ambiguity about the clubs future and drive share prices down so he can accrue more shares as cheap as possible before a Glazer type compulsory offer for the remainder? he would then become the outright owner on the cheap before any proposed moves to EPL/superleagues are announced and be the sole recipient of any financial gain.
its just the timing of the announcement has made me think like this, but as i'm sure i'll be made aware by others, i know nothing of share issues and how they work, so i dont know if prices could be influenced in this way.After all, as you have convincingly detalied in the past few months, there now seems a real possibility of league restructuring, why would think of doing anything else with this on the horizon?
Brummiebhoy
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Paul,
You ARE just an apologist for a board which is not capable of running Celtic to its full potential. The team has been allowed to deteriorate from the heights of Seville to the depths of Fir Park because of criminal lack of investment. Yet the attitude of you, and others like you on this site is "they must know what they're doing -they're successful businessmen- let them get on with it and don't criticise them in case we upset them, or in case we encourage the (peceived) anti-Celtic media". Well I'm sorry but I'm a fan - not a sheep - and I know that Celtic could do better than this misereable unimaginative shower. DD buys shares -but this is an investment for HIMSELF he can sell them at any time. As far as I know he doesn't GIVE any money to the club. Neither does Brian Quinn. In fact they TAKE MONEY OUT OF CELTIC- they paid themselves a dividend this year (DD got £2M I believe). Quinn's salary of £15K a year is not a bad little earner considering he lives in Milton Keynes wher he pursues his other sources of income. So don't dare tell me we can't criticise them.
Finally, a question for all the people on this site who agree with the boards policy of making a priority of reducing the debt rather than investing in the team, despite the fact that the debt is entirely manageable and could easily be increased without endangering the club's future. Do you have a mortgage on your home? If so, why don't you cocentrate on paying it off rather than spending money on season tickets and Celtic merchandise etc.?
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Paul, I think on this one you have become a little carried away.
First off the majority of celtic income comes from the fans, a fanbase who wants more spent at present, imagine the reaction if someone starts creaming £20m a year off the top.
This is the whole problem with football as an investment, it very rarely stacks up. Take manu out the frame pre glazer and you will struggle to find any football club that presents a credible investment opportunity.
Institutional investors will not invest in such a fickle financial model as football and the football unit trusts aimed at individuals never made it past go.
The reason why it does not work is simple you have to spend vast amounts on your team, if you dont your revenue will drop accordingly and thus your investment.
At present, DD's only option if he wanted to sell his shares would be to the fans, this wont raise what he wants so we will all remain bedfellows for the forseable future.
DD will pray for the EPL and glazer success to boost the market but while we may make the EPL, I dont see glazer making it at manu.
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Thanks Frank, remembered that after I'd posted. I take it you don't disagree about his sense of timing?
Would still like to know what DD's investment to dividend ratio is though. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?
Bottom line is he's not the owner and shouldn't be making these ridiculous statements about people who work damn hard to be able to follow their team.
qmark.
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It wasn't the booing that embarrassed me per se, but the timing of it.
Not only was it done at a match that was being attended by a load of Villarreal fans, but at the precise time that a presentation was being made to a representative of those fans!
Those fans had come all the way over from Spain to Glasgow to witness a team whose supporters had so impressed them with their friendliness and fairness, and who profess to be TGFITW. Then they arrive in grey Glasgow to witness a choris of booing when their rep walked out to receive a gift from the club.
Do we think they'll be back to visit us again?
Maybe next time the boo-boys will engage their grey matter before opening their mouths, and save it for a match that doesn't have the same significance. They can turn up at every other match and wave anti-management banners or chant "Quinn oot" until they go hoarse. Just try not to embarrass our club so much next time.
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In an ideal world, the major shareholder in Celtic would be a quiet, mild mannered, life long fan, who would throw millions into the club to buy players as required.
But we don't live in an ideal world. Like a lot of successfgul businessmen (Bill Gates, and Alan Sugar for example), DD is used to getting things all is own way. Riding roughshod over people is second nature to these eccentrics.
Have you ever noticed, when a business is doing well, the top money men take a LOT of dosh as their reward. If things don't go well, there is recrimination much further down the food chain. Those at the top are apparently NEVER to blame. DD's comments should be treated witht he comtempt they deserve. They are typical of the sort of person these guys are.
This is merely a powerful man spouting forth, because he can, and using a forum (wether rightly, or wrongly) as a tool to do so.
We as mere fans don't know all the idiosyncrasies of business. but we shouldn't have to? Like any supporters, we want to see success on the pitch. Plain and simple. The board, and DD in particular, are well aware of this.
It has been stated many times (quite rightly)on this site, that the board were short sighted after Seville. They didn't add impetus, or funding, to the building of the team. So DD, consider this. We got near the top 2 years ago. Today, the club is worth as a going concern some £40 million. There are rumours today that Steven Gerrard might be on the move to Chelsea, or Real for £50 Million. In other words, the cost of building the team now is much, much, more than just 2 years ago. At least building it to be a top European outfit. I would suggest that you, and the other board members got this so wrong. You might like to rememeber this the next time you want to have a go at the fans.
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Since time began fans of all football clubs have always been suspicious of the suits who make the decisions at their clubs. The only exceptions to this are the clubs who spend silly money they don't have. This will never change & to be honest i'm bored rigid with this obsession at our club. The way i see it is they are trying to run the club to the best of their ability without freefalling us into crippling debt - see Leeds & Boruusia Dortmund for details.
If we existed in the Premiership then fair enough - these people like DD would be rightly scrutinised because we would then have the riches to invest & the suits would have no excuses in a financially rewarding league.
Currently ourselves & Rangers are strenghtening our squads for next season. However - One side is getting persistant coverage in the tabloids about the exact amount of money they will spend - the other side gets coverage if they are linked with a player or announcing future plans for a pie in the sky Casino. This bias in coverage is instrumental in influencing the weak minded of our support who take the bait from the Scottish Tabloids & it spreads from there.
One thing we're all agreed on though is that the communication from the club is dire. We desperately need a strong PR person at the club who can tackle scenarios head on & put things across in an articulate fashion & in a way that is idiot proof.
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Paul
Time for a vote on the site, I think.
Do you think Paul is an apologist for the board. If you do, choose "Boooo".
Or
Do you think Paul does his best to present a reasoned and constructively critical perspective on the board's activities. If you do, please click here " " and we'll send you an applicaton form for a club credit card.
Sorry bhoys and ghirls, but this board has just provided us with the best five years a generation or two or three of the Celtic support have ever had. Yes, it could have been better. But it could have been (a lot) worse.
We'll know when it's time to turn against the board. But it's not now, and for my money it won't be this board.
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I think Milkray makes a good point - the potential for a negative reaction to a takeover is probably greater in glasgow than in manchester. As celtic's income is heavily weighted towards fan spending then there is a power there to hit the bottom line if someone decided to run the club for profit.
The obvious caveat here would be that everyone would lose out in this scenario - the investor, the club and the fans. A watered down team for a watered down club with a watered down support.
Paul, do you fell a potential selling of shares by DD would be seen as a failure of the 'master plan'? I read with interest previous comment about him holding off buying more shares at the low prices of recent years as it would have looked as if he had got one over on the other guys who got on board a few years ago at his request/advice.
I did find the article strange as there appears to be no upside - certainly didn't appear to be designed to buy GS time with the transition.
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Hi all,
First time poster long time reader, love the site.
I have just read the atricle on the official site and felt that it was slightly inflamatory. Now if that is my impression of the article being edited and distributed by a Celtic source how would it read if it were to be distributed by one of the tabloids.
I was not among those booing when Quinn came onto the pitch against Hearts (I was away having a smoke.) But I would still defend the right of those supporters to make their feelings known. For desmond to come out and say;
"we on the board have never been given the slightest recognition for getting Martin and helping him build the team that has been so successful over the past years."
This statement is incredibly strange. If DD is just in it for the money why would he care what the fans think of him and the other board members? If on the otherhand he does have in emotional investment in the club how does he imagine these comments will help? Sadly I feel that this is DD shooting himself in the foot, another pratfall in the Celtic PR circus.
A number of posters have mentioned the move to the EPL. I think that this is somewhat of a smokescreen. When we use the argument of T.V revenues and contract re-negotiations will demand Celtic entry into the EPL, we forget that at present other European teams have higher global coverage than Celtic. Now I believe that given Celtic's history we could be bigger globaly than most European clubs, however we are not at that stage yet. I feel that we should be looking at the bigger long term picture which should be within a structured European league. I felt that the Atlantic league that was muted a couple of years ago would have been a perfect staging platform for Celtic to capitalise on there global potential.
Sorry for the essay but I had a lot to get off my chest.
Ryn
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chennaiseabird,
Obviously your aspirations for Celtic are as low as those of the Board.
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I perhaps may be playing with live ammo here but I don't think you can pin the blame of lack of investment in the team since Seville primarily at the door of the board.
I think Paul has done a good job here explaining the merits of the five year transfer cash up front strategy which worked well for MoN up to seville. However, the biggest failure was the lack of turnover of players during the whole 5 year period - especially the second half.
Sellable assets such as Hartson, Larsson, Mjallby, Sutton, Thompson, Agathe and so on have all been kept at teh club for as long as possible when perhaps a trading of these players for cash would have allowed MoN to bring in fresh legs instead of letting those legs creak over the age of 30.
The lack of funds generated through player sales was the key factor in there being no large investment in new players post seville. MoN chose to reward his senior players with good contracts that were perhaps too large to justify in terms of what they delivered after seville.
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Paul - on another subject i think we will be 8 players lighter than this time last year with the following players gone/likely to go:
Paul Lambert
Henri Camara
Juninho
Rab Douglas
Momo Sylla
Ulrik Laursen
David Fernandez
Joos Valgaeren
I've estimated that this would be an anuual salary saving of around £6.7 million. Am i close with this figure?
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Ok I want to clear up a few points, maybe some wrongs on my part.
Some love DD some don't fair enough but the ones who go on about he's invested his money in Celtic What money, did his money not go to Fergus McCann in exchange for his shares?
How much of DD's investment actually went into the club bank account to help out with th running of the club?
I know that's were my money and your money goes year in year out, money that comes right out of your bank account.
Paul Celtic have run up 40 million loss over the last fews years, I always thought that was the banks money and not out of DD's pocket?
Share issue's how big a success would they have been without us the fans?
How much has DD actually put into the club, and how much has he taken out?
He wants to criticise us then he has to be prepared to take some question backs, after all without us there would be no Celtic Football Club.
The chance that someone can take us over simply to make huge profits is always going to be there unless one of us comes into 100's of million ( please be me ) welcome to the modern football world.
My opinion is that any investor is entiltled to make a profit, after all thats the reason behind investing, but to treat the paying customer with such contempt was shocking, continue in this manner and the 70million turn over will slowly drop.
If Quinn and Desmond have such business acume, surely they can see that all this would never have came about if we had any sort of PR.
Love when this site talk about football, talking about finances always goes in murky waters.
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Chennaiseabird: Hi there. I think your vote is just a tad over simplistic. For what it's worth. I don't think Paul is a apologist for the board. I don't agree with everything he says, but that's what helps to make the world an interesting place. My concern with the board is that they initially got in a manager who was superb at bringing out the best in players - although arguably was too loyal to some that were past their sell by date. However, Seville should have been the launch pad to either maintain, or improve the squad. They did neither, and the slip is all too obvious. We have just lost the title to the poorest Rangers team in years.
I don't believe we should go massively into debt like Leeds, or Borussia, but some investment was required after Seville. Because of that shortsightedness, that investment will be many more times what it might have been. To say the board is doing the best they can is someway short of the reality of the situation. The board have slipped up, and slipped up badly.
We are now in a position that the ony realistic way to get extra dosh is for a team of not quite top drawer players to somehow have a good run in Europe.
I'm sorry if this sounds all doom and gloom, but if anyone can point to some positive light at the end of the tunnel, then let me know.
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Forgive me for appearing to be an apologist but can anyone explain just what exactly has the board done wrong? Are you saying that they should have sanctioned us going further into debt? If the rumoured share issue in the Summer comes to fruition then I presume that most of the shares will be purchased by DD. Is this not him investing his own money in the club? In fact this is the ONLY way that DD can legally invest money in the club as we are a plc and he cannot just gift the money. IF he gains full control of the club, that is another matter.
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Ok Paul, to accuse you of "spinning" for the board is perhaps unfair but I would still have to disagree with you on your views on Dermot Desmond. How many of us had heard of him or Fergus McCann before him before they heavily invested in Celtic ? Are there other investors out there, a la Abramovich, who would invest in Celtic ? Perhaps there are, none of us are really qualified to know. So to say only Desmond can save us is perhaps not entirely accurate.
Incidentally I don't wholly disagree with Desmond, it is wrong to boo one of our own. Our players, our manager and, yes, even our board deserve our support, particularly when the club were entertaining guests from abroad. Nevertheless it was somewhat naive of Mr Quinn to expect to be cheered to the rafters.
My point, perhaps not put very well, was that Dermot Desmond should not be using the official club site to criticise Celtic fans. He has had the opportunity to answer questions from some of those same fans and fellow shareholders at recent AGMs, yet has not deigned these to be important enough to sit all the way through or even attend at all. If he is so important to the club, as to be permitted to talk via the club website then surely it is also important that he fully attends the AGM.
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Correct me if I'm wrong....but didn't Fergus when he left say that the club's shareholdings would be structured such that th club could never be in the hands of a single dynasty ever again.
I'm sure DD's shares only amount to around 23/30%, so who would want to buy him out knowing they wouldn't have control over how the club was being run.
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At 1:17 PM, Bigchipsuk
Tommy Miller is, I believe, available on a Bosman.
Have we ever signed a Bosman??
In Saturday's paper it said Miller would be signing within 48hrs, but have seen nothing since - anybody any news?
Hopefully WGS will be back from his holiday in Spain soon & the new arrivals will start coming through the door.
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The proposed share offer will now make very interesting reading. If, as many claim, DD has given these remarks due consideration.
He points out the fans should put there money in but we here rumours of a closed convertible pref share placement. The effect of which will be to guarantee DD a return of his choosing but enable an inrease in voting rights should he require it.
Perhaps the implications of this statement give clues to future strategy or perhaps DD just got out the wrong side of the bed.
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Great No 8, DD will not sell until he knows the outcome of the master plan.
There is no great upside to this, sorry.
Cambuslang, your figures are v close to my estimate.
Anon 14.26, what a good memory.
Fergus did design his exit to allow fans an advantage, he also included a large donation to the club if they took up his shares. Unfortunately the take up from small investors was very poor. Most of his shares went to DD.
DD have effective control at the moment and will have actual control in 2007 when his convertible shares convert.
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When DD appeared on the scene, plenty of ex celtic players, some in the media, and some not, came out and said that they had never heard of him. Not one person said yes he was a well known fan who was at most matches.
The 'big shots' at clubs always get to mix with the players, so why had no one heard of DD?
He is in it for the glory, to be able to say to his fellow money men, "look at me, i am in charge of Celtic".
Sadly though, and it breaks my heart to say it, he is probably the best we can hope for. Hands up if you want a Malcolm Glazer mk2?
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VCixi. It's fairly straightforward. Celtic are completely alone in the world's top teams in that they rely on the fans coming through the turnstiles, more than anyone else. we do not have the luxury of a massive TV deal.
We had the basis of a really good squad 2 years ago. In order to maintain/improve your squad you can go the way of Leeds or Borussia, as mentioned earlier - spend money like confetti. This is the road to oblivion.
Or, the board could have invested a reasonable amount on the squad to possibly ensure continued good runs in Europe, and continued income - there are no guarentees in this world though.
If you do absolutely zilch, as the board have done, you end up with an aging squad, on long term contracts that are expensive to deal with. that's exactly where Celtic are now. The young players in the squad are good, but there's no Henrik Larssons waiting in the wings. The board is guilty of sitting on it's hands. As a result Celtic's debts are maybe bigger than they need to be, and the team isn't playing as well as it should.
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You will find it's the Celtic supporters that have put much of the money in over the last 5 years not the board.
How much has the turn over been in the last 5 years added together for those 5 years?
Can anyone tell me?
Whatever the figure,thats what has been put in mostly by fans.
After the fans have put their wonga in for shirts,tickets,(away fans pay too)etc., add in the sponsorship of shirts,advertising around the stadium,sponsorship of player cars,Celtic TV money,Setanta money,internet money,corporate sponsors,Celtic foodstuff,Museum,Celtic View(isn't it one of the biggest in UK?must be making a few quid)Celtic this that and the next thing.It all adds up,big or small
Paul or anyone,can you tell me exactly what the break down of other monies are brought into Celtic by the Board?
As you have pointed out yourself Paul,we should be doing more externally for funds for the team.
Even us poor souls on CQN have come up with some fantastic ideas recently on here,(granted a few were roasters as well)to make some extra cash.
If DD and JP McManus can spend 350 million on a golf course in the Carribean!
Before they had realised,if they build 100 luxury houses on the grounds at 3.5 million a pop,they have made their money back pronto style with a luxury golf course thrown in for free and some new neighbours.
How about they "speculate" (there's that word again)
Build some cheap accommadation beside the park for say around 500 basic rooms,nothing fancy.There's some of your travelling support from N.Ireland got a room for the night(money going to Celtic,ie players wages)instead the money goes to some as equally cheap backpackers in the city centre or more expensive hotel.
Go on speculate.
Soon there will be easy access with the new M74 right outside our doorstep.Every supporters bus travelling from the south is right on the door step son enough.
Build a pub for the masses,not just that terrible one that was called a pub in the stadium.
If drink is good enough for us in the heated seat section,it's good enough for everyone.
Sort that superstore out too,bigger doors,my daughter never knew it was there for 2 seasons and walked past it everytime without seeing it(thank god)
potential of 50,000 fans in customers in one day,yet only a handful of staff in there working.
It's not the first time I've walked out 'cos I couldn't get served.
It's not the first time either i couldn't even get in due to bad location of doors.
Get the drift?
Only took me 5 min. to work that out after reading this blog.
No money for the team,no money for the training ground,yet they want a new board room for 3.5 million!
Speculate,just like you do with EVERY other business you buy into.
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I'm certain that Paul is NOT an apologist for the board but even if he was it wouldn't bother me in the slightest, we are all big boys and girls and can make up our own minds which way we want to go, can't we? And most of us can do it without the need to be abusive to those who have an opinion that's different from our own, for those who can't - get well soon. My own take on is that since MON took over the players wages have rocketed up and as a result we had hardly any money left for new players. The money we did have was blown on the likes of Junihno, Camera, Henchoz etc. Was that the boards fault? Hopefully WGS will be able to get things back on track in terms of sorting out a wage structure that we can sustain over a long period and still sign new players when we need them
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Bhoyinengland. My point is that they can't spend money that isn't there. I will echo what Paul has said many times, we are spending more money than we earn. DD, Quinn et al even if they had the desire to can't just throw money at the club as it is not permitted. The only way of doing this is by issuing more shares which if the rumours are true is what they are planning on doing in the Summer. The only thing that they could be accused of is not speculating to accumulate as is highlighted by Anon 3.30pm, this incidentally would also require a share issue or getting further into debt in order to finance it. In the current climate do you really want to see Celtic going down the same road as Rangers did during the DA years?
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No offence to the refuseniks (before he proceeds to offend them). Talking through your bum about business because you don't comprehend it takes up valuable space on this discussion board.
Before you post regarding this, please try and take a bit of time to understand what shares are and what ownership implies- and the difference between being a shareholder (ownership) and putting money into the club buying a season ticket (cash purchase of a product). When you buy a season ticket you are buying a product- not the right to say how things are run.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shares
Who cares apart from you about how much money pro rata you give to the club and why that should buy influence? Yes, we all want to see more income but we dont want to hear you going on about it. You dont expect to go into Curry's and tell them how you think the fridge display should look just because you bought a cooker and a Dyson there two weeks before, you can express displeasure by not buying there but thats about it. You are a consumer of products in which you deem that you are getting a fair trade for the goods you receive in return otherwise you woldn't buy them.
The problem is in people conflating support for a business with their emotions. Paul is quite right to look at things in the cold light of day and delineate the realities of our current situation.
If you want to make a difference to how Celtic is run in the long term as opposed to who we get on the pitch next season then buy shares instead of that flash new Nike strip. If you buy the strip after thinking about this then dont expect the club to look at you as anything other than a willing consumer.
I love Celtic and that's why I intend to buy more shares. It is my small way of getting a little bit of control- I hope other people do the same.
ChiefChirpa
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WeeTam: Agree that MON did up the wage bill considerably. It would be fair to say that MON was a great football man, if not a good businessman. But the board are the final arbitors to any contracts. If the football team is not performing, it is right and fair to blame the manager/players. However, if you don't invest in the squad, then this is not down to just the manager. True, Juninho, Camara, and Henchoz were less than ideal - and that's being kind to them. However, the board agreed to them being signed on the wages they were on.
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BhoyinEngland. So you are admitting that the board have allowed investment in the team. Your criticism is that they allowed MON to spend the money unwisely. Hypothetical scenario: If MOn wanted to buy a player and the money was available but the board refused to sanction it because they thought he wasn't good enough. Who would your criticism be aimed at then? The bottom line is that MON was employed to make the footballing decisions, the board were paid to make the financial decisions. How can the board be criticised for the managers (or players) failings.
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I'm sorry, but I don't see how you can criticize the board for allowing MON to sign the players (ie duds) that he has signed over the last few years. If you actually look at the money MON has spent on wages and transfers in the last three years, you will see that we have wasted a lot of money. The problem after Seville was that MON extended contracts of his "big players", pushing the wage bill higher. These are players who are getting on in years (even at that time), and have little or no residual value. If the board had vetoed these contract extensions, these same supporters would have been up in arms complaining that 1)money was not being spent to keep the team intact and 2)the board were interfering in football matters that should be the manager's decision at any rate. At the end of the day, as was said before, you cannot spend what you do not have, and we simply did not have the money over the last few seasons. Hopefully that will change this summer, but we will wait and see.
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Vcixi: Of course we can't spend money we don't have, but when players are being signed up for 2 years without playing - Paul Lambert for example, then the board should have already been asking questions. They weren't. MON went to them with contracts for aging players. the board should have been looking at the writing on the walls. Old players sitting on the bench getting £1.5 a year, or getting new blood in the squad that would cost less in wages. This isn't rocket science.
Ultimately MON was paid to get Celtic back into winning ways. He left the club in a much healthier state than when he started. The board on the other hand is paid to ensure the financial well being of the club. So far, it would be fair to say, that the jury is still out. There have been a a number of suggestions made on this web site about helping the finances. Some superb, some dire. The board know full well the reality of the situation. We aren't in the EPL, so no big TV deal. approximately 60,000 every home game. Merchandising that needs improving. They should start from there and start to show some initiative. So far, the biscuit tin mentality is returning with avengance.
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reading earlier posts I note reference to the manu supporters trust.
Look at what nice things they have to say about DD, they go on to refer to our good selves as RATS, lets hope mad malky puts them out of business!!
http://www.suforum.org/newforum/showthread.php?t=17072
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The closest current comparison to the Lambert case would be Jackie, so for arguments sake if WGS decides to give Jackie a new 2 or 3 year deal and the board knock it back, who do you side with? If there is anyone to be criticised for the Lambert situation it is MON as it is him that made the recommendations on who to keep/lose. If the board are guilty of anything it is having too much faith in MON. The level of criticism they would have received in the Press and from MON and from the majority of us it has to be said if they were seen to be obstructing transfer and re-signing decisions would be tenfold to what it is now believe me.
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that SU Forums made my day! so glad we can get on their nerves like this, wonder how many of the will be wearing chelsea shirts in a few season
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From the shareholders united page.......
"Has anyone noticed that wherever you are you are never seemingly more than a metre away from someone in a green and white shirt?"
This from a supporter of "the biggest club in the world"
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Vcix: Mmmmmmm. I suppose that's why Mr Lennon hasn't been signed up then. Maybe the board finally got off it's backside and decided that this was getting too expensive. However, you talk about criticism. Can Celtic get anymore critisim than they already do off the Hacks in Scotland?
On top of this MON was well known for being too loyal to older players when he was at Leicester. If the Celtic board didn't know that before they signed him, then just who is to blame for that? John Barnes perhaps!!
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Hi Paul,
It seems to me that this time you are verging on scaremongering. Although my analysis is going to raise more questions than answers.
Why has DD chosen the aftermath of O'Neill leaving to discuss this. Why not when we were chasing the SPL.
Why on the one hand has there been a commitment to underwrite a further share issue and then state a displeasure of irked fans will lead to further investemnt drying up.
When was DD commitment made to the issue? pre or post BQ boo fest?
I still cant see the logical link here until these questions are laid bare.
It smacks of desperation on DD's part. Unloading that at a time when we are beginning to regain a sense of confidence as Celtic fans. This has also been driven in part Paul by your analysis over the last ten months that something big is developing.
Im none the wiser and a whole load more confused
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I deliberately chose not to use Lennon for that precise reason. MON has himself mentioned that Lennon is perhaps going to be good foe another year and if he was still here would only be offering a years contract (perhaps MON had learned a lesson). The Lambert situation is closer to Jackie's in that they both might be good for another year or two but are (or were) still a gamble. As for being over loyal to his players, are you saying that Sutton, Thommo, Hartson etc should have been sold earlier or let go for free at the end of their contracts?
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Let's get this straight. The booing of Brian Quinn WAS an embarassment. DD has the right to criticise this and was expressing his views to the Celtic website NOT an Anti-Celtic tabloid. Just as the Celtic fans love to moan....O'Neill's sides too boring...Board not spending (despite MON using a lot of cash on contracts) ...Strachan not good enough..Lack of ambition, they are moaning again. Why don't you all shut up? Get behind the Club or go and phone your mates Provan and Keevins!
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Anon 4.29
I agree with your point about MON being known for being too loyal to older players before he came to Celtic, and so it proved after Seville. But lets be reasonable. The guy just took us to a European Final....in the minds of just about everyone, he could do no wrong (especially with the supporters). The board are not there to make judgment decisions about football players...they always seem to be slated for never "knowing the first thing about football". So MON comes to the board after taking the club to their first European Final in 33 years, and says he wants to sign xyz, what do the board do? Tell him no because we want you to sign players a,b & c. You have to cut the board some slack over that. The fact that the likes of Thommo et al are on huge contracts now is MON's fault. Just look at BBJ....we sign him to an improved contract when the majority of the support admit he has not been at the races this season.
The reason that we are in our current position is quite simple in my opinion. We DO NOT have a scouting system. I'm not even sure if we know what those words mean. We are incapable of identifying young players on the continent that could possibly do a job for us...you know, a few petrov's perhaps. The only player MON signed in this regard is Balde. We wasted roughly 50 grand a week on Juninho and Camara at the beginning of last season (not to mention the 1mil we paid to take Camara), when we could have used the money to sign a few Bosmans. Even Rangers have managed to do that in the last couple of years. They offered big money to Boumsong and then turned around and made a nice profit off of him. They got Prso for nothing, and while I don't think he is as good as they make out, you would have to admit that he has not done too badly for them. This is the primary reason I blame MON for the lack of fresh blood coming into the team in the last couple of years.
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sorry BhoyinEngland...I apoligize for calling you Anon there (looked at the wrong post heading)
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Paul,
In response to my response to you.
I know full well that Celtic is a business.But, you know as well as I do that it doesn't just stop there.
Why do you host this blog instead of say "Tesco Quick News" as they are a business as well (and a very well run one at that apparently).
It is to me, more an emotional investment than a financial one. A pint with your mates before the game, discussions in your work with fellow tims,European nights etc, etc.
I wish I had more money to invest in Celtic, as do you and every other fan. But we all aren't multi millionaires.
To those who post about people like me , (who question DD's ulterior motive). I ask you this .
Is his investment as great as yours emotionally ?
I know that emotion don't pay the rent but conversely money doesn't win you titles either and whilst you pat him on the back about how prudent and fiscally "tight" the PLC is managed you may not have noticed that we didn't win the league this year.
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Martin spent most of money in the first year and replacing our stalwards with players as reliable is not going to be easy. It is actually amazing how these players have lasted. Just think of how Jock Stein had changed the team from 1965 to 1970 and then to 1975. At a time when the youth policy was working! We have squeezed the maximum out of these guys.
Ian, Old kilpatrick
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Skelly2. Nae bother.
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rhino , just one thing , admittedly i had never heard of the bunnet but everyone in ireland knew who desmond was before he invested in the hoops...
and yes i thinkhe is in it purely for profit , zero emotional attachment
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Agree with VargasShampoo at 2.15.
Unfortunately, Paul and others can go on about amortisation,commercial investments,business plans etc. all they like but the majority of Celtic Supporters still read such informative publications as the record and the sun (although I will never understand why). I don't understand half of all this business talk but realise there is more to financially managing a club than a Keevins "50,000 season tickets at average price of £500 so where is all the money going???" but this is how many Celtic fans think (or are programmed to think by the press).And they are the ones who will be booing the chairman regardless of who he is.
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Skelly2: One wee point. I seem to remember in the immediate aftermath os Seville, that we were all asking how much loot was going to be given to the manager. The answer was not really an awful lot. The board took the decision to pay of some of the club's debts.
One thing in MON's defense though. If you compare him to managers like Sir Alec, Arsene Wenger, or Jose Mourinho, they are all guilty of signing players who just haven't made the grade.
Kleberson, and Liam Miller are never going to be first team regulars at Man Utd. Unfortunately for Miller, the Exeter game lingers on in the supporters minds. In this MON is no worse than any of these guys. He is maybe just not ruthless enough at letting players go though.
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I’ve never heard the fans say: ‘Let’s double the price of season tickets so we can use the funds to buy players.’”
Does anyone remember Mr Larsson's farewell fiesta? Maybe someone should remind Mr Desmond before he or his friend Mr Quinn include any golden handshakes in future.
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I think the Celtic plc board and in particular DD should concentrate on what they are supposedly good it - running a plc.
For BQ to make a presentation at any game to visiting supporters is all wrong anyway - this was a football matter and should have been handled by the team management, the 'suits' should stay in the boardroom and keep off the grass.
If the board dosen't know by now - you can't please all the people all of the time so why put yourself in a position to be abused by the support even if it is only a minority. The place for the board to be public is at the AGM which DD seems to treat with some disdain, does he not wish to face questions on the board's handling of the club?
The question I would be asking if I was the major shareholder is Why are we losing so much money and what can be done about it?
I am sorry but there does not seem to be much good business practice on display from our very 'successful' board.
Celtic more than any other club depends on money direct from the support, we need to be told what we are paying for and not to be told off for expressing a perceived general point of dissatisfaction with the way the board are directing the club, the only place a supporter can register their dissatisfaction is at a match.
No one is the winner with DD's outburst apart from the blood suckers of the Scottish press.
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I don´t think it is accurate to accuse Paul 67 of being a stooge for the board. As long as I can remember he has been pro-active, encouraging CQN readers to get shares to become part of the financial scheme of things. I would like to get a few shares myself if I had any spare cash.
As he mentions in his latest post this is not exclusively his idea, Fergus McCann, at the end of the five year plan, wanted the Celtic supporters to take up ownership of the club. Fergus took us to the water but alas we could not drink from it. To go into the reasons why within the West of scotland, no big Celtic supporting investor was to be found to invest in the club would require a mammoth explanation of the nature of investment in Scotland. Luckily Celtic have the next best thing, an Irish Investor, because the club is almost as Irish as it is Scottish, or almost as Scottish as it is Irish.
Although this scenario was the best that we could have hoped for, the game is moving forward and Fergus´s bunnet is on the peg and it is the man with the golf visor who is scrutinising the horizon.
And we see DD flexing his muscles. His comments are opportune in that he has said very little in recent years and would like to put his stall out. At a time of transition it is important to hear his voice. Sorry I don´t agree with posters saying that he is washing the dirty linen in public. Particularly opportune is his tribute to Martin O´Neill and his comments about the Scottish media.
But when he says that the booing of Brian Quinn would put people off investing in the club I suspect he is actually giving out signals that he is looking for investors. Perhaps he knows of some people who have just come into 60 million pounds and are looking for a going concern.
I feel 50-50 about the booing incident. People do have a right to express their opinion.It was very unfortunate that it co-incided with the visitors from Spain but I don´t think the Villareal visitors will have been fazed by it. It is very common in Spain that "Presidentes" get booed.
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BhoyinEngland
Fair point about how much MON had to spend on players after Seville...lets face it, the kitty was pretty much empty in terms of transfer fees, no arguement there. And I also agree with your point about comparing him to Mourinho etc...the only difference being that they can afford to make those mistakes, we can't because we simply do not have the money.
My main criticism of MON is not that he didn't buy players, because we all agree we don't have a lot of money. I criticize him because he knew that there wasn't going to be a lot of money available to buy players, and did nothing to compensate for it. Basically, when you can't buy players, you have four options.
1) Bring in youngsters from the youth system -- I'm not even going to argue this one, b/c we have hardly produced anything worth mentioning in the last decade.
2) Sell players on to generate funds -- MON has never done this, and in fact, re-signed players to the point that this will be very difficult to do right now, due to a total lack of residual value at the club
3) Sign players to pre contract agreements under the Bosman ruling -- when was the last time Celtic did this? I can't think of one instance where we signed a first team player under the Bosman rule
4) Identify young players at other clubs and sign them for nominal fees before they make it big -- similar to what Celtic did with Petrov (as I mentioned before).
You would have to agree that MON was more than slightly remiss at points three and four. The money was certainly there for point 3, just look at Juninho, Camara, Gray etc. I would cut him slack over point 2 as well if we weren't still saddled with those contracts right now. I don't want to seem like I am completely slagging off MON, because I think he did a lot of good things for us (obviously!!), but I find it hard to criticize the board entirely, when at least part of the blame should probably be centered on MON.
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Paul
Surely we can't exist as a club, constantly worrying that DD is going to spit the dummy and sell to a big bad outsider? Is DD not already the big bad outsider?
The club i love should not be balancing precariously on a whim of some absentee landlord.
And if my memory serves me correctly, in the View at the time of the original share issue, DD said that he wasn't a soccer fan, but his son did have a "football pitch" in the "garden" called Parkhead or paradise.
Furthermore, Paul, didn't DD not sue (or threaten to) the Evening Times for suggesting he was looking to sell his shares? "Its an emotional investment" says DD and didn't he promise his son he would never sell the shares?
Point is, he can't have it both ways: Threaten to sue or threaten to sell.
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We should be careful here not to hurt poor DD's feelings. It is well known in Ireland that he is very liberal at handing out libel suits, it has even been reported that his name cannot be mentioned in the Irish Times
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BhoyInEngland - not sure Wenger is a good example to use. Fairly certain I read relatively recently that he's only spent a net £1m in his time at The Arse. Has sold well (his first act was to punt Anelka to Real Madrid for £26m) bought and reared his teams.
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Interesting link.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/m/man_utd/4612947.stm
Alex Ferguson has reportedly spent 18.6m on transfer fees for 8 keepers since 1999.
It almost makes our flops pale into insignificance.
KD FfM
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Skelly2
"Bring in youngsters from the youth system" - Rangers don't have an abundance of players from the youth team either and nor do Arsenal (well not english players), Man Utd (apart from those that arrived with Giggs etc), Chelsea etc. At most you can expect 1 or 2 on the fringes of the first team. We need to look at having an overseas scout or linking up with overseas sides.
Bigchipsuk
Your list of players are at least attainable but have you added in wages and resignings in your £10m?
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If Dermot Desmond were to sell his Celtic shares to a mini-Malcolm Glazer type then it would confirm most fans' initial suspicions about him anyway, that his comments about "Celtic being an emotional, not financial investment" when he first bought into the club were little more than ear-pleasing jargon.
He's treated the club and the fans with contempt with his refusal to show up at AGM meetings in the past few years, where perhaps if we were allowed to voice our concerns at him at such meetings then the type of scenes which greeted Brian Quinn onto the pitch a few weeks ago wouldn't be necessary, and now he thinks he can criticise the lifeblood of the club for voicing our concerns over where we're going??
Who exactly does this egotistical charlatan think he is trying to threaten supporters?
Let him sell his stake in the club and give the reigns to someone who will treat the club and supporters with a little bit of respect, and the sooner the better as far as i'm concerned.
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Shakey64,
I already said that we need to develop a scouting system because ours is non-existent...reread my previous two postings. Man Utd still have the core of that wave of young players and have since supplemented it with the likes of O'Shea, Fletcher, and Wes Brown (although I admit the last one is a bit of a stretch). Arsenal have tons of young players coming through (I never said what nationality they had to be...the point is the Arsenal have identified foreign kids early on and have brought through their youth system); the likes of Fabregas and Aliadiere are going to be good players for them. As for Chelsea, Huth is a solid centre-half, and lets not forget about John Terry either.
I don't understand your point about Rangers because they are as bad as us. You can't mention them in the same breath as the other three and act as if they are a successful team. The fact is they are in as bad of a position for exactly the same reason. The fact that they won the league this year does not make them a great team.
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Paul,
I agree with almost all that you say re our vulnerability. However, I can't help but feel that the weakness of your argument is the assumption that the fans would continue to finance the club to the same extent as they have in recent times. I think that the fans would vote with their feet in the event of a raider gaining control of the club. Given that the club is disproportianately reliant on season book and fan based income than other clubs are, any attempt to slash costs would be counter-productive if matched by a similar decline in income.
To those who say we should speculate to accumulate, I would ask them what they think we have been doing for the past 6 years? On a comparative basis, our net spending has yielded limited success. For a real eye opener, I would commend http://www.footballtransfers.info/ Look at the net spending of clubs like Lyon, PSV, etc. I defy anyone to tell me that we have enjoyed value for money on a like for like basis.
Great_No_8 & Skelly2
Good points well made re management of playing assets. I've made the same point myself previously. I detect that more fans are coming round to this view.
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Speaking of youth players, I would not be surprised if our proposed training facillity was set up as a subsidiary business, with ownership of the youth players a la Rangers Youth Development. The reason for this being that if you develop an asset (ie your gifter starlet) from beginning through full use it has no value on the balance sheet, as an extreme example Ryan Giggs has no value on Man U's books, and neither did Beckham, until the point he was sold. This is why Rangers FC "buy" players from Rangers Youth Development, after all the money only changes hands on paper but the upshot is that Rangers FC have a healthier list of assets, plus the can fiddle the books by inflating the costs if they had to (I'm waiting for the day Rangers buy one of their own players for over a £1M).
Sorry for the essay.
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Anon 7.52, not sure if you can do that as a PLC. Rangers don't have all of the financial restrictions we do in that respect. Even if we can, it doesn't do us any good. The only thing it accomplishes is that it makes the overall financial picture look somewhat better for a potential investor (unless you are Rangers and then it miraculously gets the media off your back).
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Anon 2.24
I agree with every word you post, apart from the adjective. Seville? Low?
Time will tell.
Great_No_8 Iagree with every word you say. A manager has responsibilities. Ours accepted his, took the acclamation from us he deserved with modesty, and took the blame for black Sunday.
Bhoyin England 2.43
First of all, commiserations. It's hot, sticky, alien and football free over here. There it's England.
Secondly, I agree with everything you say too, even your third paragraph. Dare I say Seville?
And yes, we have just lost the league to the poorest Rangers team in years (apart from last year's rabble, but then you said "team"). Paul posted an emotional response after black Sunday about strategic misdirection. Sometimes you criticise the leaves when the fault lies with the wood. Strategy didn't cost us the league. We lost the league because we lost our nerve at the death and, incredibly, because for the second time in 3 years our goal difference wasn't good enough. Would we have lost the second if we hadn't had to chase the winner. We'll never know, but I don't think so.
Blame the board if you like, but BQ doesn't wear the boots, DD doesn't decide the tactics. The team was good enough in talent, but failed. We, MON, they will just have to live with it. But let's rise above blame.
The light? Your support for the club.
Seanbhoy 4.45
I'm with you mate.
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Possibly not skelly2. The re-evaluation of the Rangers squad will be akin to the increase in value of their land and buildings a couple of years back.
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Yeah that is right Anon 8.07; the problem for us is that we would have to report it in the financials anyway, so attaching a value for our players as an asset simply creates a corresponding liability. We can't set up a separate company, whose financial statements are not connected with Celtic Football Club.
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I didn't think the booing of Quinn was that loud.
Sure, you could here it in the stadium but I didn't think it was so loud that DD would be able to hear it on the 14th green at The K Club!
Whatever you think about the relative merits and achievements of DD and the board surely no one can think his comments - threats? - are acceptable?
Not since the dark days of the pre-McCann era has there been so much acrimoney between the board and fans.
DD has come across as an arrogant bully .
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I'm glad I'm not the only one who appears to be reading at as "Don't dare boo my pal" but "that was really embarrassing, booing so much that a presentation to visiting fans couldn't be made, especially since they'd set up their CSC in honour of our behaviour and friendlyness as fans, and also since they're probably not that concerned with the minutae of Celtic fan/board politics, probably thought the booing was something to do with them."
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Think Zen, think negative influences. Maybe that booing cost us the league? Maybe we wished it on ourselves, because we want the board to fail?
Maybe it'll happen again next year, if enough of us want it?
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Hi all,
I have been reading Pauls site for a few months now and generally found it most informative if not, at times a little speculative. In those past few months everything has been very very positive and very upbeat however, there is definately a mood swing here and things are getting much darker, all very doom and gloom, especially in light of DD's comments, a real downer. Please Paul next post give us some good news for Ghods sake!
All the best to WGS, may he reign supreme for a long time to come.
Hail Hail
Alex
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Skelly2
Sorry the point I was trying to make about the other rabble is that they are in a similar position and haven't exactly made great inroads as far as youth players coming through. What's wrong with our set up - we win the youth, U21 leagues etc but then the players get to the brink before diappearing to Preston, St Johnstone, Dundee etc? And when we find a few who might do the biz we fail to keep them (Burchill, Millar etc) As for Man Utd they have links with Belgium and African teams as well as their own youth set up and considering their scouting network they haven't down too well over the past 5 years. Chelsea must be thinking the same with recruiting Frank Arnesen as their "superscout"- maybe Abramovich doesn't have an unlimited supply of dosh, or maybe he is cleverer that we give him credit for.
I thought we were going to have a link up with AC Milan - did that ever come off?
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5:29 PM, fbicfc
Well said.
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If anyone is interested, The North Stand now has a white Nike Swoosh across it. I saw it with my own eyes today..
Are we being paid extra for this??
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Did anyone else receive the fans questionnaire today??
Does this mean our opinions will taken into account??
Will the board acyually listen to us and act on our responses??
Hmmmmm.
Nike swoosh?? Nice. Wait for the press release.
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If it's correct that the Nike swish has appeared in the stadium, then this again is another PR shambles. Do we have to hear this from the Scottish tabloids before the club actually get round to announcing it.
Why do they always need the media to spur them into action.
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Thank God the subject has changed, I was ready for slashing my wrists.
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Jinky,
I got the survey in the post this morning.
I think the general make-up of the questionaire is poor.
It seems designed to find out better ways to squeeze more money from us than being a genuine attempt to listen to the real concerns and issues of fans.
Hail! Hail!
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Paul/Anyone - could you please enlighten me? Isn't it the case that DD is only one shareholder among many, and that the shares of the many outweigh his shareholding by more than 2 to 1?
How could a minority shareholding overrule the wishes of the majority? If the majority are not in agreement with his sale of shares to whoever in the future then surely they would not also sell to that same person and so the new owner of DD's shares would still only be one shareholder among many. He may be the BIGGEST shareholder, but he still has a minority of the shares?
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BennyBhoy
¿qué?
Hable a muchacho inglés
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My cousin tells me(usually reliable - he works in CP)....
Bellamy is staying - he wants Champ League football & has been advised that Everton are not and have never been interested in him.
Wife likes Glasgow & has no intention of moving abroad. He wants his future sorted out sooner rather than later.
Will sign three or four year deal -with various options/get out clauses.
Watch this space........
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Bennybhoy, DD alone has 28% though his friends have more. In 2007 his convertible preference shares become ordinary shares which will give him a majority of the company.
Anon 11.59, I have hear the same.
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it's beginning to dawn on me how important this site is becomming.i have never heard or read a level of celtic debate as good.well done paul67for the stimulus,even though today's article has addded even more stress to my life,if that was possible.i used to come on here to relax.
dd has no more emotional attatchment to celtic than dwight yorke.his coments were simply a disgrace,only showing how removed he is from the people/rocks on whom the club is founded.
however as he seems to be(temporarily) up for the battles ahead and 100% behind wgs,most importantly financially,i'll forgive him and his millionaire meglomaniac lack of manners.
i may even forgive myself for booing bq one day.
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Ahll say it desmond and brian BOO BOO BOO BOO BOO BOO BOO now get over it. If all I had to worry about was getting booed ffs I would be a happy man.
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I've bided my time but I now think things are getting a wee bit out of hand. First, let me stress that I have never met Dermot Desmond or, indeed, any member of the current board. I still recall DD's gesture (for charidee!) of bidding 1million dollars for a round of golf with Tiger Woods and recalled the Gospel tale of not letting your right hand know what your left hand is doing when giving to the poor. And tales are legion of DD and his pals (including former Rangers benefactor Joe Lewis) betting megabucks on single holes during their "my wallet is bigger than yours" golf outings.
Plainly put, these guys have more money than they know what to do with. They also have egos to match.
However, I noted the effusive praise of DD which came from the lips of the sainted Martin O'Neill, a man who knows more about the inner workings of Celtic Park than any of us could ever know. MON gives DD massive credit for the last five years. On this site, it seems, bloggers are queueing up to give him abuse. Whose version do we trust?
Let us think back to the last share offer. Dermot Desmond and his pals bankrolled it. Without that injection of cash, we'd have been up a creek that rhymes with pit.
Agreed, his last published comments were untimely and verged on the condescending. But who published them? Celtic! It was not a covert threat to the fans - it was sheer stupidity from an organisation that has not yet learned the trick of promoting a single, cohesive message.
Dermot Desmond wasn't pleased about the booing of Brian Quinn. Why do WE have to tell the world that NOW?
But the fact remains that Martin O'Neill has thanked DD many times for his efforts over the last five years. Can we perhaps take it as fact that he knows some things that many contributors to this site do not?
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Frank from Bedlington said:
"I am now seriously depressed. If your list is the level of our ambition then god help us."
For the record my list was:
Paddy Kenny (Sheff Utd GK), 27 years old, for £1.5M
Derek Riordan (Hibs) 22, for £0.5M
Paul Hartley (Hearts) 28, £0.5M
Tommy Miller (Ipswich) 26, for £1M
Bellamy (25), 1 yr loan for £1M
CSKA left back (22) for £2M
Leaving £3.5M for 2 decent centre backs.
And I added:
"So we get three good international attacking midfielders, a decent international goallie, a top notch international striker, and a very promising (UEFA Cup winning!) international left back, and all for £6.5M. And what's more, they have an average age of 25 years."
I think it was DD who recently said that the club would be making purchases within it's own price structure, and that hte fans would have to have realistic expectations according to the quality of those players.
Well Frank, I think that given the allegedly available budget of £10M, if we could get 7 international quality players plus a goal every three games midfielder from Ipswich Town, this would be quite an achievement. Would you prefer to blow the whole £10M on buying Bellamy and Robbie Keane?
I'd rather see us strengthening the team in all positions with players of a reasonably good quality and still generally in their early to mid 20's. These players would increase the competition for places, thus keeping the current players on their toes. It would also mean that we no longer struggle to put a fit team out when a few players get knocks. And the new guys would undoubtedly improve when they start training and playing alongside our established senior pros.
Perhaps you have better ideas? If so, please share them, rather than being negative. If I want negativity I'll buy a Scottish newspaper...
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If you like Frank you can have Antti Niemi for Paddy Kenny. Niemi doesn't have the benefit of youth like Kenny, but is undoubtedly more experienced at the top level - and let's face it, he's had plenty of practice shot stopping at Southampton! But can he maintain the same level when he only has to deal with a shot every 15 minutes or so at Celtic?
The two extra defenders could be Andy O'Brien and Paul Konchesky, or we could bring in some cheaper (and lower salaried) foreign defenders.
Also, I notice that Liverpool have now been linked with Feyenoord's Dutch international striker Dirk Kuijt. He was one of my suggested acquisitions last week, and would still be a good addition if we could get him. But if we do go Dutch, do we only have to pay half his fee?
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Hello Paul ,fellow celts,Is it just me or do other fans think ,that BQ , DD need a thicker skin,booing is just part of landscape in sports, I was at a new york yankee game on a business trip, i asked my host why all the booing, That's george steinbrenner coming out the owner for a presntation ,He spends $260.million a year on players and its been 2 years since we won anything,Why you boooing him I asked ? we can boo the players at every game how often can you boo a owner, as George left he was waving to the crowd,You have to be a bit tough to survive in professional sports, the players shouldnt take all the stick...
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Can anyone help,I'm looking for a website that can show me the share prices of Celtic F.C. on the market?I have looked up a few but most want you to join up with them,or am Ijust looking on the wrong sites?Hope someone can help as I want to see how the shares are trading before I consider getting into the mirky waters.
Many thanks.
Lee Anne Australia
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Lee Anne -
Try Londonstockexchange.com and search for Celtic or CCP (the trading code). Or try BBC.co.uk and search for share prices and then Celtic
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You can get the celtic share price on www.celticfc.net click corporate, invester web and the share price click for update is highlighted in yellow
or www.bbc.co.uk/business under the market prices there is more market data click this, top right search company or market type ccp and hit go select celtic.
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Bigchips - I don't pretend to have the answers if I did I wouldn't be stuck here working for the man.
I dont wholly disagree with your list it's the inclusion of journeymeny such as hartley, miller, kelly and o'brien that worry me. Is that not tantamount to going down the laursen, sylla, fernandez route again.
I would prefer to see more quality and less quantity although I recognise there may be a need to numerically strengthen also.
Re. Riordan although I would have him I actually liked o'conner better based on the 4 or 5 times I have seen hm in the flesh.
Once again we seem to be ignoring the european market although hopefully things are happening in the background.
Anyone else like me think we shouldn't be trying to talk bobo round. let him go!
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Morning All
In terms of the Bellamy deal, I have been told that he only has firm offers from Villa and Celtic at the moment but his agent has fielded calls from 'bigger' clubs.
Craig isn't married but he does have children, one of which stays with him and his girlfriend. His youngster is of school age and this is a big factor in where he and his partner want to stay.
Before the cup final, he had decided to move on however it is now a much closer race between staying and going as he has been swayed by strachan's plans for the team. For what it is worth, I think he would choose celtic over villa but the unknown factor is whether these bigger clubs come up with an offer.
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Frank - I agree - I think it's time to get shot of Bobo! Of course this is on the basis we can find someone better to replace him. And if we cannot then we need to be asking serious questions of the Club's scouting dept. Which to be fair many have been asking already! Hmmm...did I just talk myself out of wanting shot of Bobo? Nah!
On Desmond: I agree with what he said about booing BQ being embarrassing and a bit misplaced. Very disappointing especially in the context it happened: Villareal fans; and if it was due to perceived lack of investment then the fact it was misinformed booing. Don't really want to go into all the why's and wherefor's as this has been done to death here already (to the usual high standard).
I would say, though, as Bellshill Tim said - without the supporters there would be no CFC! I presume DD is looking to make a killing on his investment. The only way he is able to do this is because WE have given him the opoortunity and the vehicle to make his money from Celtic...No supporters = no Club (at least as we know it today) = no vehicle = no opportunity. So I think it's a bit rich of him having a go at the supporters in some of the other ways he did in his rant. Don't bite the hand that feeds you Dermott.
In particular the comment about fans not offering to pay double season ticket prices was a joke in my view - a bad one. The prices go up every season, the fans pay up, not to mention merchandise (we will pay Nike who will pay Celtic), catering, programmes, Setanta (aye that's right we pay any money the Club gets from this), etc, etc. How many income sources are there that the supporters don't pay for one way or the other? You could count them on one hand.
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Great No8, a guy I know was on holiday in Portugal recently and met David O'Leary, who told him that Villa are no longer in the race for Bellamy because they can't match the package that Celtic have offered him. O'Leary might have been bluffing, but I hope not.
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Doom and gloom from too many. The Evening Times ran a story about DD selling out last year and his lawyers were onto it like a shot, with a lifetime commitment coming from DD.
Brian Quinn gets £30k a year from Celtic, not a penny more. I think that's a pretty pawltry sum for what he gives the club. This guy was the deputy governor of the Bank of England for goodness sake. He is a genuine Celtic man. OK, his PR stinks and he's a little removed from Joe Public but I'm glad DD stood up for him.
Celtic's accounts are remarkably healthy given the trading environment, thanks to world class stewardship over the past few years from guys like Brian Quinn, Sir Patrick Sheehy, Peter Lawwell.
Celtic are no less and no more vulnerable than ANY other club - STOCK EXCHANGE LISTED OR NOT! Remember Glazer will de-list MAN U, putting them on a similar standing to Rangers, i.e. accounts that do not stand up to Stock Exchange rules.
Personally I think the stewardship, and ownership of the club is very healthy and we should all be focusing on the football, as I firmly believe that's what matters to our Board and major shareholders.
Kevin
Chartered Accountant
Blantyre
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First of all I can not believe the accusations being thrown at Paul here… “a stooge for the board” FFS give my head peace…
The reality of the matter is he is only putting the facts up here for your digestion, if you find them unpalatable then tough, welcome to the real word, but get off Paul’s back.
If I may I’m just going to refer back to this “David Murray and Magic Disappearing £50 debt” As I understand, all Murray did was transfer the debt from one arm of his evil empire to another. While the Rangers books look that bit healthier the entire Murray group is still heavily indebted.
If his empire comes crumbling down then it takes Rangers with it, furthermore until he cleared the debt off Rangers books there was a possibility that Rangers would drag his entire group under.
Now back to the issue at hand, I see DD’s very public attempt at dressing down the fans much in the same way I view Quinn’s phone call to the “P.R.” dept. We all know what he said carried some weight but do we really have to air our dirty laundry in public.
I have had many a verbal rammy with Man Ure fans over the whole Galzier thing and what few of them are prepared to admit is once they went public (when Edwards made over £90million) then benign taken over was always a very real prospect, lets not forget the changed their name from M.U.F.C. to just M.U.
However we at Celtic must also accept this outcome is not just a possibility but a very real probability in the current environment.
If you can, buy shares in the club, if you can’t remember having an emotional attachment to a P.L.C. means sweet f.a.
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vcixi
let's get the truth about the board sorted out. you & others on this site have insinuated that MON was given money and wasted it.
Fact: the board did give martin money initially and that's how we got to Seville.
Fact:For the season after Seville He was initially given nothing and then £300,000 for Stephen Pearson. Where did the money made on the run to Seville go?
the board decided it was time to be prudent - big mistake when we were just a few good players short of joining europe's elite (see porto). That was a extremely bad financial decision -Quinn and co. got it wrong,and we ended up in Fir Park.
MON did later waste money on the likes of camara and juninho etc. but that was because he was given a pittance for a transfer budget. he's obviously "not at his best", shall we say, scrambling around at the lower end of the market - but that's what our boards ambitions for Celtic are!! Remember the dwight yorke fiasco!- an example of what can happen if you're desperate to take anything you can get.
If the board are so keen on being prudent, and the club are making a loss, then why did they pay out a dividend which cost the club milions? did DD and quinn need the money? why did they ignore the pleas to invest it in the team????
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Paul, Shareholders United have set up something they call The Phoenix Fund. Could this model be incorporated by the ordinary shareholding Celtic fans? I've read their statement and it seems a genuinely sound idea especially if DD was to sell his shares to a small-time corporate raider, or anyone else for that matter. Not sure if it is something that can be set up as a preventative measure, or does it make sense to wait until the shares are in the hands of a Monty Burns before this type of action is deemed appropriate.
Just wondering...
TinneyBhoy
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chennaisebird,
the board gave martin real money pre Seville -we wouldn't have got there without it. i'm complaining about there policy since then.
i would consider fir park pretty "low". wouldn't you?
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Anon 10.42. The board did indeed give MON money to spend over a 5 year period and he chose to spend most of it in the first year, a fact that is well documented in previous CQN articles. The money from the run to Seville went on paying the wages of the players that actually got us there. As for the dividends the board are legally obliged to pay these out, the one criticism that could be levelled at them is that they were not willing to consider the re-investment of dividend money from the smaller investors that so desired to do so although with the upcoming rumoured share issue it could be argued that this is the vehicle for such a re-investment. You talk of the lack of investment after Seville, can you please tell me where this money should have come from? Further debt? New share issue? Doubling the price of season tickets?
Incidentally the season ticket prices have almost doubled since Fergus' time but that's another argument.
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hey have you all read Kevin, the Chartered Accountant from Blantyre's post? (10.10) surely he's winding us up?
£30k "a paltry sum" for a part-time job??!! oh but he worked for the bank of england so he must be good! hmmmm, but we make a huge loss every year under his stewardship, and the team have been allowed to decline because of lack of investement.
well i always thought some of board's fans were detached from reality ....
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Anon 10:42 am
"Let's get to the truth about the board...?" Please tell us the truth about the board then rather than giving us empty soundbites. Just make sure you back it up with facts or no-one will take you seriously. Except Hugh Keevins. And his pals.
The season after Seville Martin was given an extra 5 million compared to the season before (see comments by Petyer Lawwell at the edn of 2003/2004 season)...which he chose to spend on paying more money on new contracts to existing players. He could have chosen to sell these players, add the 5 million to the proceeds and buy some new players on the same money those he sold were on. He didn't.
THAT'S WHERE THE MONEY WENT! Where do you think it went - under BQ's matress? Has Eric Reilly hidden it in the European Cup replica in the trophy room? Or did DD lose it in a bet with one of his rich buddies on the golf course? Please put us out of our misery and tell us where the money went if you are so sure it wasn't spent on the team and reducing the debt a wee bit. I'm sick to death of people moaning about money the Club had not being spent, without trying to work out what actually happened.
And the Club paid out dividends because it was a legal requirement of previous share issues. Or would you rather they broke the law, got fined and whatever else, then had to pay the dividends anyway, resulting in being more out of pocket? Dividends were one of the costs of raising the capital associated with those shares in the first place.
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Frank from Bedlington...
You said:
"it's the inclusion of journeymeny such as hartley, miller, kelly and o'brien that worry me. Is that not tantamount to going down the laursen, sylla, fernandez route again."
I say:
I have previously expressed concerns that Hartley is a bit too far through his shelf life to be a real long term prospect, but he is a good reliable player that could do a job for 2 or 3 years. Tommy Miller would indeed be a gamble, but he is a free-scoring midfielder of reasonable quality. Kenny (not Kelly) is an international goalkeeper, and O'Brien has considerable experience in the Premiership and in Europe.
Granted, I'd rather we were buying Terry, Lampard, Scholes, Henry, and Ronaldinho, but we unfortunately live in the real world, and play in the SPL. Not to mention the money.
You said:
"Re. Riordan although I would have him I actually liked o'conner better based on the 4 or 5 times I have seen hm in the flesh."
I say:
Does your wife know you feel like this? ;0)
You said:
"Once again we seem to be ignoring the european market although hopefully things are happening in the background."
I say:
I agree that we should be seeking out more gems from lesser known markets, as with Petrov. We have contacts such as Jansen and Lubo, who (if they aren't already) would, I'm sure, be happy to help out for a fee.
One player I'd like to see us pursue (as I have said previously) is Dirk Kuijt of Feyenoord. They won't be playing Champions League football next season, he is a proven prolific goalscorer, has European competition experience, is still young, and the media has been linking him with a move away from Feyenoord this summer.
However, we also have to balance our signing policy against the up-coming UEFA regulations on home based player quotas.
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Paul,
Have you a link to your thoughts on Murrays 50 million.
I know you said you are tired of saying but I missed your comments on it. I am interested on your take on it.
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vcixi,
you are completely wrong. they were NOT LEGALLY OBLIGED TO PAY OUT A SHARE DIVIDEND.
I absolutely dispute that the money from the run to seville was used to pay the players wages. this is a common myth peddled by the board supporters. Every team has to pay players wages and extend contracts every year - most can still afford a transfer budget on top of that.
and yes, if we needed to we could increase our debt level to invest in the future. this is common, good, business practice.
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vclxi, I was under the impression that the club had talked to supporters representatives and said that they were considering introducing a dividend reinvestment programme. I think this was around the time the results were released. But I have heard nothing since.
Perhaps Paul can shed some light?
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Anon 1106 What ever your opinions of the merits of how good a job BQ is doing and my opinion is that it could be better, £30K per annum for someone of his calibre and experience is nothing.
These guys can expect to earn thousands of pounds per day if they were employed as private consultants, so £30K a year from us is mere pocket money.
If you don't like it then please also complain about the cowboys who charge the rest of us extortionate fees for doing 'Part-Time' work. I give you the plumbers who charge £50 an hour for looking at a drain or the bloke who fixed my TV aerial and charged me £190 for 20 mins work.
Sorry when I compare the two scenarios its the so called 'blue-collar' worker who is fleecing me more.
BQ, DD and Celtic's PR is a fiasco at present. The MON 'wait until we have something to announce' stance has been blown out of the water. Lawwell must address this situation quickly on top of identifying new revenue streams to help the club finances. If the club does not take control of its own PR and marketing then were basically going to stagnate as a club and a business,
Big Chip. I know Andy O'Brian has experience, but how can he possibly be a target. I hope that his name has not been put forward because of the 'Oh he's Irish' Link and before people think I am anti the Irish link my family is from Belfast so support the Republic as well as Scotland. Is he any good? IMO No. Yes he was unlucky to be sent off at the weekend but his performances at the heart of a naff Newcastle defence and the fact that Gary Breen often manages to keep him out of the Irish Defence tell me he is not any better than the players we have already. Why not give McManus a go or O'Dea? If not why did we give these guys long contracts?
Would rather buy players that will enhance the squad than buy just for the sake of it.
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Baldymeister...
"No better than what we have" is becoming an oft used phrase this close season.
Again I come back to the matter of who we can really afford and who is actually happy to play in the SPL - we have probably already reached the best quality that is prepared to play in the SPL, so it's difficult to get substantially better.
Yes, I'd rather have Ashley Cole, Sami Hyypia and John Terry in defence, but they wouldn't be interested. But if we can get into the Premiership that's another matter altogether!
I totally agree with bringing through our own, and the new UEFA ruling dictates that we must. But there is no reason why the likes of O'Brien can't help bring these youngsters on. His European and international experience would be beneficial.
Finally, I'm a little confused. If you're from Belfast shouldn't you support Northern Ireland, not the Republic? Isn't that a bit like someone from Edinburgh supporting England?!
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When MON arrived, Petrov was on a low wage, c.£3,000pw (which in comparative terms was £2,000pw less than a certain U21 player). Given Petrov's performances, MON continually 'ripped up' Petrov's conract and rewarded him with better terms etc... The money to do this has to come from somewhere.
Now take all the other players Celtic have offered better terms to, or have signed, and that is where the money after Seville went to; to keep that band of high achieving players together by paying them top dollar. Any money provided includes the wages as well as transfer fees. Simply buying a player because of his price tag is wrong. Is Flo any better than Larsson because he cost 18 times more?
Personally, I think MON was correct in keeping the proven players together by rewarding them rather than taking chances on others at the expense of keeping, perhaps, Petrov, Sutton etc...
It seems to me that the Board have kept their promise of providing funds to MON; just that MON saw it more beneficial to use that money to pay his current team. And buy Pearson.
Just my opinion...
TinneyBhoy
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Big Chip,
Like many in The 'Celtic Family' my background is totally jiggered to say the least.
Born in Cov to a Belfast Dad and a Highlands mother. Family over there support the Republic as many do and I also follow Scotland as is my right.
Remember supporting NI during World Cup '86 but as a teenager watched the great 'Anton' booed by the Windsor Loyal on TV well before the Lenny incident so any feelings for them fell by the wayside.
As a former egg chaser, though, I do follow Edinburgh as my Scottish provincial team having lived there for 10 years and studied with a couple of the players and Ulster is my Province in the Irish set up. Have had a few strange looks from Celtic fans for wearing the red hand jersey, but FCS the red hand is on my family crest so i find it strange when people assosciate it totally with loyalist paramilitaries.
Going back to A O'Brian I am still not sure whether his 'experience' would benefit the team. Also with Paddy Kenny, he has as many caps as Marshall. Yes he looks good being kept busy with the Sheff Utd. team. Rab did with the Livvy team as well. Can you be sure that he will be able to cope with only being asked to make one save in a game every other week as will possibly happen if he signs for us.
Big Chip, I would rather see the money spent on bringing in and on the best youngsters we can get our hands on, unless it is on a player who will walk into the first team and enhance the whole club. I agree with Riorden, would like also Zander from Aberdeen, perhaps Faddy from Everton and your CSKA full back idea or the Hungarian lad that scored twice against Scotland from Full back as well. But buying expensive in terms of wages guys from England is perhaps not the best way to move forward IMO.
Hail Hail.
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jimios
what's hugh keevens got to do with this? is it that you thinkk that if you slag him everyone here will be on your side?
anyway his analysis is at least as good as yours.
maybe you're right - the money could be under BQ's bed. That's as good an explanation as Lawwell's.
if all quinn's promises made over the share issues were legally binding we'd be in court already -i.e. to be used to buy players, & fund new training ground.
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Oh this BQ booing and DD comments are now getting boring.
Right I agreed with DD statement didn’t agree with the tone it was administered but all in all the board have done an ok job IMO.
That’s not to say that their has been bad management decisions both on and of the park.
For me the board have failed to explore avenues to bring in more revenue. They have fleeced you and me dry. It has been said many times on this board and also guys have came up with many ideas how to increase revenue.
Also they have failed in improving media outlets for Celtic which if were decent would bring in more revenue.
The board have now begun to make head way in maximising sponsorship with the Nike deal and the supposed Nike Tic on the north stand.
We should also be looking at breaking away from our friends over the river as they ride on our coat tails
As much as it sticks in my throat I understand the need for the Nike Stadium.
On the playing side mistakes were made with the limited budget that was made available. The proof is all the players that we are calling for to leave (deadwood seems to be the term) MON signed and put on decent contracts which made / make them nigh on impossible to move.
MON decided to renew contacts instead of improving certain areas of the team, fair shout for some Sutty, Thommo, Balde, Lambert, Petta, Petrov, BBj, Marshall, McGeady, Henke, Didi, Jackie, Varga are all players off the top of my head that have received contracts in the last 18 months.
Some deserved others not, but MON called it as he saw it but im sure in hindsight he might change a few of his decisions both on the resigning and signing of players.
These areas of mismanagement lead us from Seville to Fir Park.
Could be worse I have just had a conversation and the names Martin Hayes, Wayne Biggins and Stuart Slater came up. Would we like to see a return of that standard of player gracing the Nikee Dome? (Dome or stadium what sounds better?)
The bottom line is under DD and MON we have improved performance both on and off the park.
Can’t ask for much more
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Kevin, the CA from Blantyre. A nice calming opinion, you make good points.
I think that we've argued this point to death; To boo or not to boo? what is the point of the question?
We can only speculate to DD's intentions and I don't think the latest comments he's made have made it any clearer what these are. When asked (in the past) he has responded by saying that Celtic is an emotional investment, good on him. Why shouldn't we believe him?
We're all agreed we'd liek more money spent on players. But is this at any cost? Success on the field equates to financial success off it (I'm sure there are asset strippers and some who move money around doing deals with other companies they own), there is no evidence to say that DD has not backed Celtic being progressive. Unfortunately we live in austere times (as far as Scottish football is concerned) andwe cannot afford to simply thow good money after bad, we cannot buy at any price, we cannot take finincial risks knowing that there is no payback in teh short terem.
The long term is still up for debate, whether this great British or Euuropean competition comes true. Where would we be if we were £70+ million in debt and on a dodgy finincial seating, would we be invited to join teh party - Not likely.
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Afternoon all,
I get your point about Desmond Paul he could get a much better return for his money and alot less hassel. However, After reading your other articles on Glazer and the future Premiership TV rights why would Desmond sell up knowing that?
So I dont see the need for panic just yet. I see from the papers today he and fellow Man Utd chums are buying the priory chain. So they still have plenty of money to burn.
Last week we were worrying about the exodous of players leaving after MON going and so far only Bobo has hinted at leaving.
Its the same with signings as well. If Strachans got £15m to spend and needs to buy 6 new players they are not all going to stars. Especialy if Bellamy is going to be £6M.
So enough worrying out there & keep the faith.
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My my Baldymeister, you do have a convoluted history. Although I can't compete with that I was actually born in Islington (so a Gooner by birth), but my father took us north to Broxburn, West Lothian, within a week of my coming out of hospital after my birth.
Before my sixth birthday I had a big sister, a little sister, and two wee brothers - five of us in all (so we could have been Irish I suppose!). I grew up in West Lothian then the Borders, but, probably influenced by picking up little snippets of news about Celtic winning everything in sight through my early years, I ended up following Celtic.
Although I did go through school supporting both Scotland and England (but Scotland in the head-to-heads), I now find myself rather apathetic towards both. With Scotland it is the descent into (and even beyond) total mediocrity that has dampened my spirits. But with England it is the arrogance of almost everyone connected with English football, and their insulting attitude towards everything Scottish, that has turned me off, even though I now live in England. I don't really identify with an international football team at all nowadays.
Anyway, back to the matter at hand!
I can accept people's reluctance to get enthusiastic about the likes of Paddy Kenny, Hartley, Tommy Miller and Andy O'Brien. But we are in the middle market, unable to compete for the elite.
I'd happily have Niemi instead of Kenny, but Niemi is over 30 already. So would he (or Marshall) be happy to stay with Celtic while the other one is between the sticks? Kenny is younger, on a much lower salary, and more likely to be patient and await his chance.
There are others that I would prefer to O'Brien, like perhaps one or two of the Everton defenders, but O'Brien is available and these others aren't. As we can't offer huge sums to entice players mid contract, we can only sign players who are available. Maybe someone else can proffer a list of what defenders are currently up for grabs?
I wholly support any suggestions that we move away from constantly signing players from the hugely overpaid Premiership marketplace, where we have to diminish our own transfer budget by assigning a disproportionate amount of cash to wages rather than transfer fees. However, we also have to balance the make up of the squad from a language and culture point of view. The players all have to be able to get on really well together, and our team spirit and togetherness have indeed been among our strongest points through the last five seasons. Many underachieving teams have just too much of a mixture of different nationalities.
So yes, let's continue to produce our own talent, and to supplement this with a few considered signings of experienced players who can help to develop and improve these Bhoys. This will give us a good, close, long term core of a team to take us through the next few years, and enable us to comply with the UEFA rules on home grown players. Perhaps we can start a decade of dominance like "Fergie's babes" did, with the young Bhoys developing and maturing together into a formidable unit.
But we need to ensure that we have an ongoing trickle of quality new faces coming in to ensure that they don't all grow old together like MON's team. Or like Fergie's team too, we could end up quietly slipping into another period of nothingness.
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I would just like to ask one question of all of those who slag off the board. Have you actually gone onto the Celtic website and looked at the financial statements. Where did the money go after Seville? We made a loss that season: we made it to a European Final, and fiscally still made a loss. And not only that, even if you take away the amortization charges that Paul has been mentioning, we STILL made a loss. Our after tax loss for the year was 11.66m and the amortization charge was 10.33m. So please explain to me where the board are supposed to get more money. And before you even mention the the debt, that went up that season too, by over a 1m quid. The fact is, the money has gone to the wage bill. It doesn't just disappear. O'Neill spent just over 5m (as someone mentioned previously), to get Hedman, Laursen, Broto, and Varga, not to mention the money paid out to get fernandez at the end of the previous season. How many of those players are in the first team right now? One, Varga, the only one he didn't pay a transfer fee for. That is where the money has gone.
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Fair play Big Chip
Islingtons not too bad is it. Anyway to matters at hand.
Noticed that Glazer has just appointed his sons to the board at Man Yoo and reappointed some Commercial director he had sacked last year.
Paul can you shed some light as to why he would remove someone then reappoint them later to the board?
Surely that would involve incurring unneccessary costs.
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One question that is pedalled by some hacks and is now repeated often by a growing number of 'Tic fans is "where did all the money go?".
Every year Celtic produce financial statements and accounts. This explains where the money goes. It is a legal document, subject to full INDEPENDENT audit. It details exactly how much each board member takes from Celtic in remuneration and details material shareholdings (and therefore dividend entitlement).
Yes, you need some training to understand them, or alternatively someone else to explain them. The media should be the forum for the explanation. It NEVER is. Instead the media disseminates sensationalism and scandal mongering. I feel we are all now bogged down in this.
Just because I support the board does not make me detached from reality, or any less (or more) entitled to an opinion than anyone else on this forum, 'Tic fans one and all.
Trust me, the accounts make good reading in hard times. Revenues are up continuously. They have to be - Players' wages EXCEED season ticket money. Does this start to explain where the money goes?
Maybe a summary of the accounts could be provided by one of the fans forums, such as CQN, from a fans perspective. I would be happy to get involved if anyone is interested in taking this up and we can clear up one hell of a lot of misconceptions about how our club is run.
Then we can get back to supporting the team which is the reason for our passion and strength of feeling.
Yours in Celtic
Kevin, Blantyre (again)
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Baldymeister - I think we have to be cautious when it comes to signing young players. Look for instance at our own young players - most of them started off brightly but faded like Marshall, Maloney, Pearson, McGeady. That's not to say we write them off completely, but the balance has to be right between youth & experience & they have to be exceptional.
McFadden is a definite no no - he always looks dangerous, but his play more often than not, comes to nothing. He will never grasp when to square the ball to a team mate in a better goalscoring position.
Zander Diamond - looks steady in the SPL, but is he any better than one of our young boys coming through. If Kennedy comes back well - Diamond wouldn't get near a first team place
Riordan - not convinced. OK in SPL, lightwait in Europe. Would rather persist with McGeady
You mentioned the CSKA full back & the Hungarian boy - but again for every Lubo & Henrik, there's been a Riseth & a Tebily.
I think it was BigChips who mentioned the type of signing we should be looking at. The 24 - 30 age bracket, european/international experience, played in a physical league and is underacheiving. That was MON's recipe when he fist arrived - Sutton/Lennon/Hartson/Thompson etc & for the first 3 years was a treat.
I hope we go for players like O'Brien/Konchesky/Keane/Huckerby/
Forsell/Niemi
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On reading about the pros and cons of Dermot Desmond's running of the club, it makes me think that you are very often with the devil that you know in many instances.
Desmond does have his critics amongst the Celtic supporters, but with the help of the Celtic supporters is running a reasonably successful company. Bearing in mind the amount of criticism that Fergus McCann received for running a very good business then maybe it's us the fans that need to take a look at ourselves and actually ask the question, "What or who do we want to run the club"?
It is unrealistic that the fans will run it, due to financial restraints, so is it a Glazer type sugar daddy that is required?
Similarly, you could have someone like Romanov at Hearts, whose aim is to establish a link between his Lithuanian Bank and The Royal Bank of Scotland through a RBOS director who is also on the board at Hearts. This will be far more profitable for him longer term than Hearts, although he knows that he could get his money back on that investment tomorrow if he sold the ground to property developers.
The final option would be for a major company to take over the club. In this instance, then they would want as much profit from the club to pay their shareholders. A very bad idea in my book.
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non 10.47
Yes, Fir Park was low. The lowest ever for me I think, or at least since Kai Johansen's replay winner. I was younger then, and took things harder.
The point I was trying to make in the rest of the post is that it's stretching it a bit to say that the board caused Fir Park. The players were good enough, the manager was good enough, but not on the day and they blew it. It happens (ask Milan), we love them anyway, we don't need to find someone else (the board)to blame for Fir Park.
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Some sensible comments VargasShampoo, but Forssell is reported to have just failed a medical at Everton, although he is denying that he has even had a medical with them!
I would imagine that Konchesky's wages at Charlton are within our scope.
I am not sure about Huckerby though. Isn't he getting on a bit now? And he's one of those that have always promised so much but never quite delivered. He should have achieved what Bellamy has (without the baggage), but never quite made the grade.
And then there's the matter of Keane making noises about not really wanting to leave Spurs, unless they tell him they don't want him.
As I have suggested before, we might be better trying to get Bellamy to sign another 1 year loan deal, and putting to Keane's agent that we'll offer him a pre-contract in January so we can get him on a Bosman at the end of the season (to replace Bellamy).
This way we could pay £1M for another season of Bellars, after which he can return to Newcastle (as he has always said he would prefer to do) when Souness is binned, and get Keane for nothing. This has to be better than spending £5-6M to buy either of these guys.
I have also heard noises in the rags about Claus Lundekvam being available. What do you think about him as an option?
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Some of the people on here are a red neck. Obstinate refusal to learn anything from new knowledge. The old entrenched views come out no matter what.
First of all £30 grand a year is peanuts for the likes of BQ. He does do it for the love of the club, he can easily get better money elsewhere.
The stewardship of the club has been great over the past 5 years, the club has been prudent, hasnt overextended itself (judging by some of the deluded punters on here Celtic should go to Paul Ferris for a loan to get more money just now).
Celtic's budgets are no different from your household budgets. If you spend what you cant afford it comes back and bites you on the arse.
That CA from Blantyre was only pointing out what is apparent to anyone who has any sort of a clue about business, yet he gets slated for it.
I wouldnt tell you the best way to build an extension cos I dont have a clue.
Please dont talk about business unless you do. You sound foolish and the lack of judgement dimishes any comments you make in other areas.
Hail! Hail!
Peter working in the City.
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Varga
I take your point and agree but i do not see that buying a player just because they have played in the EPL is going to benefit us.
Niemi is 33, would cost £2m and had one great season at Southampton. The other time he spent there, he has been injured or No.2 to Paul Jones, and this year his team was relegated. He was ropey at times and gave away more than a few howlers, remember the last Pompey game? Is he better than Marshall I do not see any advantage in spending money on this particular player as with Paddy Kenny for reasons i outlined earlier. Finding a top cless keeper capable of maintaining concentration for 90+ mins while doing nothing is nigh on impossible. Look at the money spent by Fergie since Schmichael retired - £18.6m apparently since 1999 on keepers alone.
Konchesky - not good enough for spurs and not good enough for charlton but played EPl football for a while so 'sign him'. His wages would be twice those of Diamonds and is he better? I don't see what you see that even most EPL managers do not.
Keane at times I think he is great when he pulls on the green jersey but at Spurs, Leeds and Inter more often than not his reputation as a consistent predator is just not deserved IMO, his record is poor and he should have scored far more than he has. One great season at Wolves followed by a reasonable one at Cov is seems to be what his career is based upon at club level.
Forsell yeah if fit, would be very happy to sign this type of young class player.
Huckerby turned down approaches by MON when he was at Man City twice to go to West Brom and then to Norwich instead. He is a player happy to be the big fish in a small pond. For us is he going to take us into the next level of Europe or even maintaining our present position, I can't see it personally. If he has turned us down once i do not want him near us, similarly with Miller at Man U.
Sorry I know we have to cut our cloth, but if we are I would rather buy the same calibre player outside the EPL from other top leagues across Europe, where wages will be lower. Buying from that league involves paying inflated wages for players who are not worth it.
We bought Hartson for £6m and paid him x ammount of wages matching anything he would have got down here. Now after him playing in Europe regularly, scoring goals at the very highest level of European football he is only worth approx £1.5m and yet we have him on a contract for the next 3 years?
Why waste more money on signings which have no residual value at all. Would you buy a car on the understanding that as you got drove it one meter it would be more or less worth nothing to a would be buyer.
Apart from Viduka, we have not sold one player to the EPL for a profit. If we continue to buy from this market we are just throwing 'big' money away after bad. Riseth and others may have been failures but their wages certainly were not EPL standards and any losses incurred upon them were absorbable into the finances much more quickly.
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I liked the latest Rab Douglas story:
"Douglas takes pay cut
Leicester manager Craig Levein has revealed new signing Rab Douglas has accepted a "fairly substantial" pay cut to secure his switch to the Walkers Stadium.
The 33-year-old goalkeeper put pen to paper on a three-year deal this week after his contract expired at Celtic.
Levein said: "Rab has taken a fairly substantial pay cut to come to Leicester and that just shows his ambition."
Craig Levein is clearly a little confused by the situation.
In this article reporting on Rab's move to Leivester "after his contract expired at Celtic", Levein is quoted as saying "Rab has taken a fairly substantial pay cut to come to Leicester and that just shows his ambition".
Exactly how much do they pay on Jobseeker's Allowance nowadays? If he hadn't taken the job he'd have been unemployed!
That shows common sense, given it was the best offer available to him, not ambition.
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I've been reading all of the transfer talk over the last few days and it surprises me. For all of the bashing that goes on here towards the crap media in Scotland (and rightly so IMO), why then do we bother to waste time on transfer targets that they propose. When has anyone remotely connected with Celtic come out and speculate on which players we want to sign, other than Bellamy. I've seen us linked with four different left backs in the last four days (Bridge, Konchesky, Alexei Berezutsky (CSKA), and Jerome Berthod). Why is this? Because everyone knows we need a left back, so the papers just pull names out of thin air. Now it may be that we sign one of these players, I can't say we won't obviously. But the papers have no more idea that any of us. Take Berezutsky for instance. If the hacks that call themselves journalists actually watched CSKA play, they would know that we would never sign Berezutsky to play left back....because he isn't one. They play a 3-5-2, and he plays on the left side of that. Lets think of a similar situation to that....Valgaeren. How did he work out playing either of the full back positions? If we sign a left back, it will actually be a left back (or so we would hope).
As for the rest of the players that have been mentioned, Kenny is more paper talk and quite frankly is not the answer. I would rather have Niemi for three or four years. Anyone watch the Scotland game at the weekend? I thought Hartley was rubbish and I certainly would not sign him on that performance. He would fit right in with our team though...his delivery with crossed balls is deplorable. Tommy Miller is more paper talk. I don't know anything about except that he scored 15 times from midfield for Ipswich last year...but again, he came out this morning and insisted that no one connected with Celtic has had any contact whatsoever. Getting Bellamy on loan for another year is a pipe dream because Newcastle will definitely cash in this summer, no doubt about that. As for Riordan, while I admit he is a decent young player, would he be given a chance at CP. None of our youngsters really have been given one. There is no point paying money if we won't play him, especially since we can sign him for nothing next season if he really wants to play for us. As for O'Brien, it is possible that a new manager gets something different out of a player, but he can't get a game over Titus Bramble, who really is completely overrated. To me that says it all. He may do a job for us, but given our budget, 2m (albeit again, more rubbish paper talk...but using that as a number)is far too much. I might sign him for less than a million, but that would be about it. If we do sign Bellamy, that blows that entire plan out of the water anyway because you can be sure WGS has money set aside for a GK. So we suddenly do not have a lot of money to play around with (assuming of course we are talking about 10m, which again, is more tosh printed by the rag et al).
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I must agree with you Vargashampoo about signing players from the EPL. Anyone remember when Steve Marlet went from Monaco to Fulham? Fulham paid about 12.5m for him, and his weekly wage in France was just over 12,000 quid a week. What 12.5m player do you know of in the EPL that is on anything less than 30 a week?
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Skelly 2,
About two years or so ago I made up a story about Celtic being on the verge of "swooping" for a young Slovakian player whose name I can't remember.
While the player was real everything else about the story was fabricated by me.
I made up quotes from the player and from a "Celtic source". I posted it on the Huddleboard as a parody of a tabloid transfer story.
The very next day the story appeared - virtually word for word - in several tabloids with The Star giving it full page coverage!
Even teletext carried the story and all of them featured the quotes from the player and source which I had made up!!
I think that says everything we need to know about the tabloids and transfer speculation.
Hail! Hail!
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Bonjure folks,
If we're talking about players singing, we all know we need a leftt back , but the main problem for Celtic over the last 2 maybe even 3 years has been the total lack of width. personllay I'd punt Hartson (done us a good tunr but not fit enough now) and Thompson. Realistically £3 maybe £4m there put that towards a good young left winger mcgeady on the right then we have plenty coin left for a GK LB and another striker. Russian football is on the up again, plenty of good players who would prob jump at the chance of a top standard of living in the UK.
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Check out the share price today. Up 8%.
Someone is buying a decent number of shares. Not massive amounts but enough to move an illiquid stock.
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At 65p each isn't that roughly the price that they were sold for when Fergus left?
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Im pretty sure they where over a pound
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Well can't really do much better than that Wee Jinky.....well put.
In terms of what we need, I am in agreement with Bazzabhoy...I would punt Hartson and Thompson. I think 3-4 million is not an unreasonable expectation for the pair. In terms of what we need I would say realistically we need:
1 GK
1 LB
2 CB -- assuming one of them to replace Balde
2 MID -- one in the middle and wide
1 ST
I think that is really pretty close to minimum of what we need. We may not get it all, but I really feel that we need to at least accomplish most of that list. For me, a GK, CB, and a wide midfield player really have got to be at the top of the list. As was said earlier, we have absolutely no width whatsoever, due to a dire lack of pace.
I would be interested to hear what other people think we need position-wise in terms of priority, and who they might get rid of.
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BigChip - Konchesky would be a good one i think. He is in his early 20's, really quick, can play left back or left midfield, attack minded, can deliver quality crosses & Erikson capped him for England - so there must be something there.
More than anything we need a top drawer Goalie & Centre half. Niemi is the one. A centre half who can command, keep the shape of his defence & use the ball is crucial. If you look back through all our comedy performances in the past couple of years like away in Lyon/Seville/Fir Park/Anderlecht etc you'll notice Balde in every picture with his shorts at his ankles
Lundekvam - not sure, but he is a regular in the Norway team. Some might say that we're looking for better than that but players like Varga/Broto/Vega/Mjallby prove he could be a short term answer till John Kennedy is back on song or if big Aitken comes back
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Thanks the water bhoy.
Tinneybhoy 10.44 am, the time to prepare is now, Shareholders United left it too late.
You are all wrong on what Brian Quinn earns; its £15,000 per year,read the accounts :-)
BigChip, they have said they will come up with a proposal to reinvest the dividends.
To the guy who USED CAPITALS TO MAKE A POINT, you are actually wrong in your point. As long as the club has liquidity and is solvent they are legally required to pay the dividends that have been paid in the last five years (all preference divs.).
Richie8, no chance of DD selling before England is decided, thereafter will depend on his appetite for abuse.
Background on the Murray £50million and some good information on Celtic as well go here:
http://tinyurl.com/8oktj
My first tinyurl!
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look at what desmond's been up tae noo!
http://tinyurl.com/9nzyh
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I think Niemi is the ideal man for the No 1 jersey. He may be 33 but that is no age for a goalie. Ideally he would be our main keeper for the next three seasons with Marshall his understudy.
At left-back I think we've now missed the boat for the man I would have went for - Julio Arca at Sunderland. This time last year I am sure we would have got him for the 1.5m we wasted on Camara.
For all the talk of Riordan and Hartley , if I had to sign just one player from the SPL it would be Zander Diamond.
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Any thoughts on MAtthew Upson anyone?
From the BBC Sport website:
"Upson rejects Birmingham contract
Matthew Upson career statistics
Matthew Upson's Birmingham future is shrouded in uncertainty after he turned down a new contract at St Andrews. And Upson's agent Barry Neville hinted the England defender may leave in search of European football.
He said: "We did speak to Birmingham about a new contract but Matt decided he did not want to accept it."
The 26-year-old has been linked with Middlesbrough, and Neville added: "I think Matt feels he needs to be playing in Europe."
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Wee Jinky, agree with Diamond, if JK can come back the same player I think they could go on to form a great partnership. The only other SPL player I would sign would be O'Conner, I think hes a ready made replacment for Hartson would rather him than Riordan, plus hes 'Celtic minded'.
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Agree Wee Jinky, Niemi is the man, full stop for me. We can get him, he would come, seems to make sense. The left back position is a bit of a problem, as I'm not sure who I would go for. If true, Konchesky isn't bad as he is quite quick. I think Diamond has some potential too, but I haven't seen enough him to be totally sure. The one thing I don't understand is how John Kennedy suddenly became a world beater. I know he was playing well before he was injured, but come on. How long had he been in the first team? He played well in Barcelona to be sure, but I can think of another Celtic player who was out of sight against Barca, and has dropped down considerably since then.
As for Upson, I haven't seen enough of him at Birmingham to say definitively, but I didn't think he was that bad at Arsenal. I have a mate who is a diehard Gunner, and once told me that behind Henry, Upson was the second fastest player during the training exercises at Highbury. But I guess that rules him out then because we don't sign players with pace.
As for the other players, I personally think Riordan is a decent player. I would prefer him to O'Connor because he provides us with what we lack...pace (he is supposed to be Celtic daft as well Bazzabhoy....although how can any of them make that claim after what happened against Rangers at the end of the season). We have other people (Hartson, Sutton) to provide the power up front, and we certainly don't need a third. I have not been impressed with Hartley at all the last three times I have seen him, although he did well with the goal against us. He isn't what we need anyway, as a winger with some pace is crucial IMO. Petrov and Lennon are our preferred central pairing, and I don't want anyone signed that is going to make Stan play out wide again next year because that is a waste of everyone's time.
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On the subject of new players how about the Norwich goalie Green. He seems to be on the move and is a good up and coming keeper.
Midfield - 2 Charlton players - Danny Murphy or Matt Holland would be great additions to the squad. Both quality players that have done it at the highest level and probably wouldn;t cost too much. Murphy did it in europe with Liverpool and has England caps while Holland was great in the last world cup and regularly turns it on for Charlton.
Also Gera from West Brom looks the part and is to good for a team like them. I think hes the captain of the Hungarian team as well.
Striker - How much would Barros cost? I don't think he has long left on his Liverpool deal so might only cost £3m. Also Mido from Spurs looks a player and is only there on loan.
All premiership players on high wages I agree but I dont know any players from the Eastern block or Skandinavia that aren't already at decent teams.
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Agree on Stan, prob one of the best centre mids in the UK, needs to play there. I meant O'Conner to replace Hartson, selling him on. Riordan is def not a Celtic man tho, die in the wool hibbie lives a few doors down from my mate. Plus O'Conner has beeter teeth.
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Fergus sold his shares at £2.70
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Richie 8 -
Matthew Upson
Paul Konchesky
Andy O'Brien
Danny Murphy
Mikkel Forsell
Robbie Keane
Anders Svennson
Voltan Gera
Stelios Giannakoupolos
Anti Niemi
Some of those would do
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CambuslangisaReality -
I agree good list, just don't like O'Brien much. He is the only one I wouldn't include.
What about Huth from Chelski?
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Hi Paul (and all)
Paul...I have BQ in my accounts at £30K unless you know something I don't (page 22)...
With regards to the share price; this board is becoming more like an investor page than ever before....Beware of people ramping up shares to line their own pockets!! (I don’t mean DD)
Its in DD's interest to talk down the shares btw....(that might explain the timing of his recent outburst- call me a cynic if you like)...the lower the shares sink below the underlying value the more he picks up at a bargain price and so on.... NegAnon this is right up your street is it not?
Still no sign of that new budget Paul- what have you been doing with your spare time ;-)
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Kevin from Blantyre, good posting mate (1.23) , well written and makes a lot of sense, Players wages exceeding gate money, who would have thought. You should sign up for this website, it will give any future postings you make more credibility, the anons on here tend to be ignored.
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I think Upson is a non starter purely on the basis that he still holds some hope of becoming an England squad regular.
A move to the SPL would kill off those hopes once and for all. I think he is more likely to end up at a EPL club of the stature of Boro or Everton.
Same goes for Rob Green at Norwich.
Riordan and O'Connor both show a lot of potential but at the moment I don't think they would give us any more than Beattie.
I think you're being a wee bit harsh on JK Skelly!
I dont think any of us are saying he is a world beater but in his short time in the first team he proved he had all the raw materials to become a top class defender. Alos put in some good shows for Scotland U21s.
Like Bazzabhoy says , if JK and Diamond - who is deffo Celtic minded - continue to progress the way they have then in a few years they would make a great defensive partnership.
BTW can anyone remember what happend to the two Slovaks we were linked to last year. I think they played for FC Nuremberg?
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Is it just me or is anyone else checking News Now every 15 minutes to see if theres any transfer news.
I need to get a life.Or maybe do some work.
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Dimitar Berbatov was one of the Slovaks - he went on to be the top scorer in the Bundesliga this year.
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peter who works in the city,
What colour is your neck?
The fact that the board can produce figures that add up proves little. The deluded punters are the ones like youself who believe "the stewardship of the club has been great over the past 5 years". Nobody's asking the club to spend what they can't afford. In football, if you don't spend what you need to, it comes back and bites you on the arse - as it did this season.
You're right about household budgets though, and most household budgets these days include a mortgages and various loans don't they?
Oh but I don't work in the city so I must sound foolish. My wee sister works for the Bank of Scotland though.
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Fair dues Bazzabhoy, especially the part about the teeth :-). I agree Richie, I think Baros could do a job for us, but I would rather see us go for Kezman. I know he has been rubbish this season at Chelsea, but I have watched him play before that for PSV, and he can score goals, flat out. To be honest, spending the 6m on Kezman and a winger is IMO a better value than spending it on Bellamy. I don't know if we can get him, but the person I would be looking at is Martin Petrov. Left sided, fast, can cross a ball, and can get the odd goal or two (memories of Ross Wallace clean through on the goalie can now be expunged). Plays for Wolfsburg in Germany, and I'm not sure if we could get him for 3m....but that would be a great signing. I don't think, given the major surgery required for the team as a whole, that we can afford to keep Bellamy. That eats up a large part of transfer budget and a large part of our available wage budget. The key is to get some of these players on Bosmans. If you think about it we will have quite a bit of wage money freed up.
Douglas 15k
Sylla 8k
Valgaeren 20k
Lambert 20k
Juninho 30k
Balde 15k assuming he goes
Camara 20k
Hedman 20k
Total 148k a week
Now I think those are pretty accurate estimates for the kind of wages those people are on. We have taken the 55k given to Juninho and Camara and used it to get Bellamy (37k) and Henchoz (15k). Even resigning Bellamy at 40k, we still have over 100k off the wage bill (with Hedman the only that might stay...hopefully not). If you do manage to punt Hartson and Thompson, we are suddenly looking at a lot of dosh to hand out to players on a weekly basis (now you can see where the money goes too).
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i know we're not supposed to dismiss comments, and i dont usually, but Richie8(and others);
A) if you think Baros(and their like) would ever even consider signing for us then i think you'r looking at the world through spectacles that are too dark a shade of green. Remember, these guys are being sought after by the likes of Valencia, Inter, Villareal. They dont see Celtic the way we see it. To them its just a (not as good) club.
B) £3 million? raise that by 5 or 6 (he's too high profile)
Basically what i'm saying that in the market we're in all the discovered, top-drawer talents are being sought after my more powerful clubs or are outwith our financial reach. So when we're saying things like "how about Michael Essien" we've got to get more realistic.
keep up the good work Paul, and its good to see the sight growing by the day.
WESTIM
ps, this is not in any way a personal attack, i just don't know how to insert a tone of voice along with my post
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As usual, around this time of year, a huge number of players get asossiated with moves to Celtic. Some of the names I've seen here are okay, but some would just be a waste of time. One thing that does surprise me, is that virtually all the names mentioned are either in the EPL, and a few from the SPL. However, what does surprise me is the lack of possible names from Germany.
Clubs like Borussia Dortmund, and Shalke 04 are virtually on their knees. Bayern Munich have already publicly stated that any of their current players who are involved with contract renewals will be offered contracts on reduced wages.
Surely these clubs would be ideal places for Celtic to possibly pick up quality players a bit cheaper than elsewhere.
I think we can all agree, that Celtic can't afford the Steven Gerrards of this world (more's the pity). However, as someone pointed out earlier, players like Hartley are not of the standard we would require.
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Agree about Upson Wee Jinky for exactly the same reasons you mention. I don't mean to be hard on JK, I'm just saying that we shouldn't expect too much. I think he can become a good defender as well, but there has been a few in the last couple of years that we have been hearing about. I can just see him going the way of Marshall in the next 18 months or so, but I hope not (however I think Marshall is still a good player).
We won't get Huth on loan unless Mourinho signs another centre-half. Since he has said he is going for three players, my guess is a left back, midfielder, and striker.
The slovaks were the Bulgarian duo of Berbatov and Petrov (see above). We will never get Berbatov, so lets not get excited about that. The thing is that some of these players over there will come, if you offer enough wages (a la Boumsong). The trick is to make sure you can then sell them on and make a profit. If you are looking for another potential wide player, I think Deisler off of Bayern would be a good signing (although not sure we would get him). He isn't getting a game for them at the moment and that is before they sign anyone this summer.
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Anon 4:36...you can't spend what you dont have.. I would love a new pair of jeans but I'm skint so I can't buy them.... what bit us on the james carter this season was playing thompson in the centre and never dropping him, playing stan on the right, when a) he was knackered and b) never a right midfielder, playing sutton in midfield.. Rememeber the team that lost to Motherwell is the same team that drew in the nou camp.. the only team they played in Europe that didnt get beat there. I would love us to splash the cash, but I also dont want to end up a selling club like r*ngers
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I think there's a few folk buzzing glue on here. Players like Baros, Berbatov can pick their league & pick their wages. Why would they come to the SPL. We're in a different market for players. Ones who have underacheived , have potential or gems who have gone un-noticed
regards
Celts swoop for Beckham..zzzzzzzz
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Wee Jinky,
Of the two Slovaks, Marek Mintal has gone on to be the top scorer in Germany this season. Not bad for an attacking midfielder. He is definitely worth considering.
At the moment there is a lot of activity in Germany. Stuttgart didn't make the CL and as a result Matthias Sammer has been sacked. Kuranyi appears to be on his way to Schalke, and it seems as the core of the team is about to break up. Aleksander Hleb (playmaker)+ Timo Hildebrandt (keeper) are the two stand-out players that Celtic should be considering.
Worth a risk would be d'Alessandro from Wolfsburg (playmaker). He captained Argentina to the Olympic Gold last year, but is out of favour at Wolfsburg for suspected (ab)use of dietary supplements, which were unproven.
Roque Junior of Leverkusen would be an excellent buy. Dede of Dortmund, Frings and Jeremies from Bayern.
Most German clubs would be happy to receive cash for players at the moment, and so regardless of their situation, players can be considered as being available, and Celtic pay higher salaries than most German clubs can afford.
In contrast to the EPL, Germany is a buyers market at the moment.
KD FfM
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Anon 4.37
Your entitled to your opinion as well and I'm not taking it personally. I dont agree with you though.
I dont think there is any harm in trying to get in top players. Sutton cost £12m the season before we got him for £6 just because he had an off year. So should we not have went for Sutton?
Baros has had a terrible season for liverpool and is looking for a move. I'm not sure how long he has on his contract although I think it is not long.
£3M might be cheap but it depends on how long he has to go on his contract. You might be right he might go for double that but look at his team mate Morientes he was top scorer in the CL last year and Liverpool got him for just £6m.
According to skysports several teams are looking at Baros but only Lyon seem serious at the moment. I know Lyon are a better team than us just now but I dont think its beyond the realms of reason to compete with them for a player. I dont hear of any premiership team clamering for his signature either.
Last summer O'Neill tried to get Saviola & Basturk to the tic and as we know failed. I'm still glad he tried though and if they had signed we would all have been over the moon about it.
So why not try for Baros while his stock is lower than previous years? If we went for middle of the road players constantly none of us would be happy. Theres nothing up with a bit of ambition now and again.
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Hang on a minute. So BOTH Slovaks have gone on to be top scorers in Germany?
At 4:27 PM OttoKaiser said...
"Dimitar Berbatov was one of the Slovaks - he went on to be the top scorer in the Bundesliga this year."
At 5:02 PM Anonymous (KD FfM)said...
"Of the two Slovaks, Marek Mintal has gone on to be the top scorer in Germany this season."
And hasn't a blogger already claimed to have fabricated this story?
As for Roque Junior, Dede, Frings and Jeremies, none of these would realistically consider the SPL, and would have options in England if they did make noises about coming to the UK. And Hleb has admitted that he has already turned us down once. And you don't get two chances at this saloon!
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Here's abreaking story that might be of interest:
http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/hi/sport/6018765.html
Also, I agree with Richie8 about Baros, insofar as if you don't ask, you don't get... If we at least enquire about Baros and he says "No", then we are no worse off than had we not asked in the first place. So why not? He just might surprise everyone and say "Yes"! His wages might be a problem though...
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The Evenings Times have come up with this latest Celtic transfer story:
"One man who could, though, is Ipswich's Tommy Miller, who has reportedly agreed to join as a Bosman on a £9000-a-week deal."
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bigchipsuk,
Things are getting v confusing!!
Firstly, I fabricated a story regarding a Slovak player a couple of season ago.
BUT it was not the story linking us to the two FC Nuremburg players which is the one we are discussing here!
I think Mintel was def one of the players we were linked with.
The German league - where clubs seem to have a good scouting network across eastern europe and Scandinavia - is def one we should be looking at. Particuarly with so many clubs in financial difficulties.
BTW I see Everton are allegedly set to step up their interest in Bellamy. An EPL club and CL football may be too much for him to resist.
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I thought Berbatov was Bulgarian......
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Indeed Wee Jinky. But will Everton still be in the CL this time next week, when UEFA have retrospectively rewritten the rules?
But if UEFA do, then perhaps we can rewrite the rule that says you can't use TV evidence to prove that a penalty was given in error. Or the one that says that having proved such an error the result can't be retrospectively amended to what it would have been without the ensuing penalty goal.
The league table would then have to be recalculated with a rather pleasant outcome...
On the other hand, if UEFA are going to retrospectively change the rules for qualification to the CL, then maybe they'll retrospectively change the rule that says that TV evidence can't be used to prove that the ball didn't actually cross the line (in the semi final vs Chelsea).
Nah, I thought not.
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Hi Guys,
On the subject of personnel, what about the two young Icelandic lads that were all the rave? Have they not come on in the juniors to break through into the first team and set the heather ablaze?
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I think the two Icelandic lads, with their dubious retro haircuts, have progressed well.
I doubt very much that they are ready for first team football yet though.
Next season should see them, hopefully, start to make a few appearences for the reserves.
BTW I see Wim Jansen is the new Sporting Director at Feyenord. Apparently he will be in charge of transfers, scouting etc.
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Kevin, ca from Blantyre wrote
Brian Quinn gets £30k a year from Celtic, not a penny more. I think that's a pretty pawltry sum for what he gives the club. This guy was the deputy governor of the Bank of England for goodness sake.
Aye right...a grand job he made looking after BCCI. He will be up in front of the beaks shortly to answer this one.
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Hows about this for a list:
GK Cudiccini: Chelsea (cannot get a game)
FB Alexander: Preston (failed to get promoted)
FB Cole (Arsenal - okay only joking!)
FB Lundekvam: Soton (relegated)
CB Upson: B'ham (looking for a move)
MF Smicer: Liverpool (on the move has anyone signed him?)
MF Holland: Charlton (Curbishley looking to shake things up there)
MF Bentley: Norwich (on loan from Arsenal won't get into their team)
Fwd Ashton: Norwich (relegated)
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Oh and forgot to mention:
CB Kenedy on way back
MF Malloney - WGS may be able to get the best out of him behind the strikers??
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From regularly reading the youth reports the young icelandic lads seem to be progressing very well, especially Finobaggson (or however you spell the big lanky striker ones name) and are moving from unders to reserve level but they are still a bit off the first team.
I wouldn't rule out a couple of the younger lads (Quinn, O'Dea for example) moving towards the current positions of Beattie, McGeady etc. with the latter becoming increasingly involved in the first team.
Remember when we hear about the young generation at Celtic thriving, playing an exciting brand of football etc. it is the generation behind Beattie, Maloney etc. that we are talking about. Their time will come and we should look forward to it, perhaps not next year for the full fruits though.
Mintal would be a wonderful signing but there are plenty of Premiership clubs (most noteably Liverpool) sniffing around him too. Baros is a complete pipe dream though, sorry but no chance.
Reidy
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Folks as always great site and great debates. I was there when fergus was booed, did it myself now ashamed i did after all he did for us. My defence was i was young (ish) drunk and angry.
Now 2005 I was also sitting in my normal seat in the north stand when everyone around me includiong myself booed DR doom himself after his ill advised attempt to show how jovial he was to our friends from Villa Re.
As i am now older and was sober i am not ashamed of booing Dr Doom and the reason was not because we were 2-0 down to Hearts. It was because on the friday before he had come out with his usual nonsense of no money for a team dying on its feet. Martin was not 100% supppourted by the board and fresh legs in Janaury would have won us the title against one of the worst rangers teams I have ever seen.
Strachan is not my choice ( i think he will be gone in a year) However we have to support him and just hope the garbage we are linked with at the moment are just paper talk and not his actual choice of player.
Come on folks we have a core of great players we need quality to back them up not squad dross from failed english championship teams and guys only good enough to get relegated.
We support the team through thick and thin now its pay back time get the cash out and buy quality not dross.
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Anon 7.02
I agree that most of the players mentioned out of England are not going to do the job for us. We would basically be replacing what we already had. However, I'm not sure we can say that we have a core of great players. We have a group of players that have served us well, but are now past it. Hartson needs to lose about three stone, Thompson is past it, Sutton and Lennon probably have a shelf life of about another year, the centre of our defence has more holes than a leaking ship, and aside from Petrov (and possibly Agathe), we have no younger players coming through to plug the gaps.
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My first posting - a fantastic site. Football is a unique business, just like the tobacco industry. It has loyal an addicted customers. That's right Paul, you said it, we are only customers. The people who manage these businesses know this. So they attempt to maximise and exploit their customers in so many ways. What are you going to pay for your new Nike Celtic top!
Diectors have a duty, both morally and legally to attempt to maximise the profits of the company they 'work' for. To pay dividends for their shareholders. Many strategies and tactics can be employed to achieve this. I haven't read all of the posts on this page but one hit on the right note for me.
When is it prudent to invest in the team so that you maintain and / or grow your market share? I think now would be and I agree that it may have been wise to increase the debt after Seville but only if it was afforable. If moving to the EPL would increase the company income and profit and uplift the share price would this not be a good strategy?
If it were to come off then Mr Desmond and friends would make a killing like the Manu lot and as Fergus did. I personally have no problem with this if they leave the club in a better position than they found it. Fergus did!
Let's wait and see if we have some investment this summer when the team needs it. If we don't it could mean that they are keeping costs down to establish a profitable position for the business. This is often done to make the business more attractive to potential investors.
I think Mr Desmond has enough savvie to know whether Celtic plc can join a more profitable market or not. I fear that if he thinks it's not possible he may cut and run. What then?
If we were to join the EPL then Mr Desmond would be laughing all the way to his offshore bank.
As for the booing. Booing is a form of customer complaint. No business owner wants customer complaints. If the business was a restaurant and you were served a bad meal - would you complain? Almost certainly, even though the person next to you may be perfectly happy with theirs.
I didn't boo, and I didn't agree with it but I defend the right of the person next to me to do so. That's OUR freedom of speech - exactly what we express here.
Mr Desmond and others should understand this, even though the timing of the proteat was poor they made thier point!
I don't believe that Mr Desmond doesn't know that many of his customers at Celtic Park on match days are full of passion and many full of alcohol. I'm not saying that all those booing wee under the influence but it would have been fuel on the fire.
My point here is this. If you're going to get booed by the pissheads then at least you could work towards getting a share of that alcohol spend for the club.
The double standards in Scotland are pathetic. The corporate bods get to buy alcohol - as much as they can guzzle. The rest soak it up down the Gallowgate and elsewhere. Has the club not thoght about investing in it's own chain of pubs and eateries around the city? Would make a handsome profit and buy a few players.
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Glad the DD discussion is finally drawing to a close.We need to move on from it.
New players - My preference is quality not quantity.Whatever WGS's budget is,I want him to get as many quality players as possible for the money.Whether that means Bosmans or big money signings I don't care.What we lack in certain positions should be subsidised by players from the Under-21 side.
I don't understand the thinking that a player may not be better than what we have,but we can't hope to attract anyone better so we should take him.Keep your money in your pocket if you can't get better and wait till you can.
I can't believe the lack of comment on the alleged "swoosh" that has appeared in the North stand.Given the level of debate when Paul posted about this topic previously,I would have thought some people would have been apoplectic with rage at the very thought of it!!! Would this suggest that they have only "named" the North Stand or do they have more work to do around the rest of the ground?
Also,will this be part of the existing deal with Nike if it is true,or will it represent additional revenue?
Enquiring minds want to know.
BankieBhoy
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