You know I love a bit of financial chat, but there is so much to do before we can consider the potential £50m that awaits in the Champions League, after Uefa announced a spectacular increase in financial distribution for next season.
We have four rounds to negotiate. Two, possibly three, will be difficult. Right now, our chances of going through stand a little below 50%. There is a lot of work to do in the coming weeks. Don’t go counting on that £50m yet.
No harm to Nadir Ciftci, who wil leave the club at the end of the month, but he was made for different times. His talent was evident at Dundee United but his work-rate there never marked him out as a Ronny Deila player. It was an astonishing signing which sent worrying signs about our recruitment processes at that time.
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hail hail
hello
nearly,hail hail Celts
what youz doing stayin in on a day like this way oot and play.
HH
Maybes if we had invested some of the £millions sitting in the bank on CL standard players we would have a much better than 50% chance of qualification.
The balance sheet doesn’t score goals nor does it defend.
Celtic don’t budget on CL money.
If we qualify it will be a £40 million bonus.
Eurochamps67
belated birthday wishes DD
HH
What happened to the Champions League money
heated feckin driveways myass CSC
The glibster’s contradictions are going to get the better of him.
They said the licence issue shouldn’t be investigated because it happened ages ago then demanded action against Hughes for something he said even longer ago.
Then they said that any organisation with nothing to hide should welcome an investigation while at the same time railing against an investigation!
If he expected Hughes to remain in place so he could allege anti “Rangers” bias then that has now gone. Reckon he has overplayed his hand.
Good news about the CL money. Let’s make sure we get there!
Preparation has to be right. Need to get proper cover for the guys at the World Cup. Boyata could potentially be there until the later stages, even if he might not be playing much.
Good also that the solidarity payments have gone up.
We’re a right back and centre half away from increasing CL group stage qualification chances from under 50% (disagree its that low) to over 70%.
I wish they would significantly increase the proportion of money that goes to Europa League participation.
Would make the competition more important, meaningful, reduce the pain of non CL qualification & therefore help subsequent CL involvement.
Paul67, I tend to disagree. Looking at those who have qualified alongside Celtic I would reckon we have a better than 75% chance of qualifying. We are a much better team than we were this time last year and I would expect us to strengthen during the summer. I would see ECL Group Stage qualification as a minimum target this season.
KTF
It has to be borne in mind that we could improve our forward, middle and back lines each to the tune of £15m and still not qualify for the group stages.
GARY67 on 6TH JUNE 2018 12:56 PM
I would reckon we are a right back and centre half away from a decent performance in the Group stage (at least 3rd) but we should have enough to cope with the other qualifiers just now. If we haven’t then we are no better than a fairly decent Europa League team and would be better off their. Somehow I don’t see that as the pinnacle for the Manager or the Board.
Friday will tell us how we are looking if we get the Edouard deal over the line by then, otherwise it may be too late to get an transfer done with PSG.
KTF
I recall Ciftci’s signing being hailed as a masterstroke on here. Freescoring in his two seasons at Tananadice,young,ticks the boxes.
Those of us who pointed out that he had only ever scored twice previously were told we knew nothing about modern recruitment.
I think he was the last stab in the dark of a discredited signing policy,and not before time. We wasted,I reckon,the best part of £20m on fees and wages in that time,and all we got for it was dross.
The club probably lost the same again due to non-uptake of season tickets in those,say,five years.
The work of a financial genius,that.
King is playing to the Gallery of bottom feeders. There is no point in trying to rationalise on conflict of interests as we all know Sevco have more conflicts than anyone.
By these announcements King is hoping that the media will take up the case and demand enquiries etc. Never mind that SPFL and SFA have rebuffed his accusations.
I don’t think other clubs will listen but who knows what the brethren will get up to.
Agree 110% Paul
Have to say the lack of a quality centre half has been a concern for a while
The South African lad wasn’t the answer either
VVD was always going to leave the saints at some stage so the “we don’t really have the money at this stage “excuse doesn’t wash at all
Hopefully there is something in the pipeline
So much for Uefa discouraging reckless spending
Kinda impossible to put a % figure on getting to the Champions League. It’s gonna be hard.
We’ve done well with it over the last 2 years, no reason t suggest we can’t again.
To make it more certain? Defence for me:-
Centre half – buy a nailed on first teamer. And if that is our biggest single cash outlay so be it.
A Right Back – I don’t glibly say Lustig is done, but he needs cover. And perhaps after a World Cup and no close season break, this needs to be a bigger priority.
An additional midfield player who is defensively astutely. When you just gotta pack he middle of the park and see out a result, we need a bit more.
Erskinetim
BMCUW @1.05
” I recall Ciftci’s signing being hailed as a masterstroke on here ” .
Me too — apparently a proven Hunskelper – he’d even managed to score a goal v Conditional Membership /Temporary Licence FC in a Scottish Cup Semi . . What more could you want ?
ERSKINTIM
I would agree with those thoughts. I suggested some possible RB names that could be of interested and was criticised by some on here saying that was disrespectful to Lustig. Which of course it wasn’t, I love the big crazy policeman but he has been known to pick up an injury or two, is getting into the age where careers need to be managed and as you mention has a world cup to play in. A younger player equal to or better than PC Lustig with the big man there as an alternative option either as RB or RCB in a 3 would be a priority for me
The only serious threat to us qualifying should come in the final qualifying round. The away leg especially ,is when we have looked most vulnerable in defence ,so this area needs to be prioritised.
“I would reckon we have a better than 75% chance of qualifying. We are a much better team than we were this time last year and I would expect us to strengthen during the summer.”
I hope I’m wrong but we might find it difficult to strengthen before we get through the qualifiers. That’s been the story of the last few years. Hopefully the WC doesn’t leave us injured fatigued players…
There is no question that the team who in line up in the qualifiers (certainly the ones before august) will be somewhat short of Brendan’s ideal team.
The guys at the World Cup I presume won’t play before August. Guys like Griff and Hayes will be still recovering from injuries and any new signings won’t have had sufficient time to settle in. That clearly suggests to me that the qualifying campaign is risky.
I’m not sure that splashing money on players even if they are of standard to take the team better in the long run would resolve that in time for the qualifiers. I’m not suggesting or advocating not signing players, I’m simply suggesting just that signing them wouldn’t particularly increase the likelihood of qualification, so perhaps the model of waiting and being cautious is fair enough.
MALARKEY et al
A lot of our “strengthening” over recent summers has been via loans,esp from EPL.
Thankfully,we seem to have used January for that recently
One big problem this summer is the early closure of the EPL window on 8 August.
Personally,I’m happy with the signing of Bain and Rogic. I expect Edouard to join them.
Then it’s up to Brendan to decide whether Commper and Ralston are capable of CH,RB,respectively.
If so,that’s fine. If not,punt and sign replacements
I’d be happier wi a clearout this year than an aimless splurge.
Paul67 et al
Sounds like a bit of expectation management in early doors Paul. I’ll take a 50% chance in the final qualifying round any day of the week but not before a ball has been kicked. We are once again in a position to improve the team, and if it were done when tis done then twere well it done quickly. Or is it not to be done at all? Celtic are in a far stronger position now than when we bought Ciftci, we have generated £8 million over the last two seasons, and that was just for the other SPL teams. So let us not pretend we cannot afford to strengthen in the areas which will increase our chance of CL qualification. We can and we should.
In the past two seasons, Celtic were available at 6/4 to qualify for Champions League Proper both times and roughly 1/2 not to.
I reckon the odds will be similar again this season, possibly bigger given there are 4 qualifying rounds this time.
So effectively, in qualifying the past two seasons, we have beaten the odds.
Hail Hail
Looks like SEÁNP1916 and I are roughly in agreement.
I hate being wrong(!)
Kidding,mate. Like you,I don’t think there’s much we can do which wasn’t done in January.
Commper and Ralston are the big question marks though
It was only a couple of years ago that Paul and Pedro told us that we will recruit players in the January window for the forthcoming CL qualifiers.
How did that work out then ?
Aye we have brought in a top quality coach, but with total respect to him, there is only so much you can improve a player and imo he has gotten as much out of those at his disposal as he is going to get.
Time to repay him with a handful of quality players, there is no real need to lay out millions, there will be plenty available for free or little outlay, just have to weigh in with decent wages.
Neganon will be all over his with his expectation management patter.
Look on the bright side, it could have been worse.
Scotland could have qualified for the World Cup!
…and the following players would have been in the squad:
Gordon, Bain. Tierney, Brown. Armstrong, McGregor, Forrest, Griffiths…
…and possibly Christie and Morgan!
Development squad for the first qualifying round of the CL!
HH!!
If there is any criticism due, i think it is down to what the club did in January. Given that Compper was ineligible for the Europa League and the fact Charly signed an 18 month loan deal I always suspected that these guys where brought in with a view to this summers games. For different (or perhaps the same) reasons neither has played and one is now fecked off. And lets not talk about Jack Hendry my views are well known as to his ability to be a Celtic player.
That now leaves Brendan more vulnerable in the qualifiers than he had planned for IMO. Lee Conerton’s role is a source of wonder for me!!!
Hi Paul67,
Yes, the prizes are getting better but so are the teams competing for qualification.
Brendan seems to have a knack of hitting the right note come KPI time but UCL qualification is not a given, far from it…
I’d definately like to see us make some significant signings and no one leaves… even if prized assets are on their way, after qualification please.
Which of course reminds me of the events around the signing of Ciftic…
We were told VvD wasn’t going to after the UCL Qualifiers were complete, this was delaying funds for the Top class striker we’d been promised.
Anyways as we all know we failed to qualify for the UCL and VvD went to Southampton.
When we asked re: the whereabouts of our top class striker Ronny said we got him…
Head scratching…. Eh!!
Nadir Ciftic was always our first choice.
Think that done for our Ronny…
AULDHEID @ 10:12 AM,
Interesting stuff from JJ there. Open and shut case comes to mind.
Yet what the Compliance Officer and his chums have been cooking up for the last eight months who knows?! They can be very inventive @ SFA HQ.
Imperfectly Compliant anyone…
See there’s an interesting discussion on TSFM re the 5WA and it’s possiblecimpact on outcomes.
Of course Charles Green refused to take part in the SPL LNS Commision until Sevco were promised immunity.
Don’t think DCK’s would be doing his nut if he had a similar agreement.
Some transparency would be nice though…
Hail Hail
Imo, no matter whom we set our sights on, if they are proven CL class, the chances are they won’t want to sign for any team in the SPFL. That’s why, I think, our manager has concentrated on bringing in the likes of Eduard on loan. Hopefully, we will sign him. (Earlier, many doubted whether that should be a done deal.) If our manager is able to do something similar for next season (especially at CB and RB), I, for one, will be happy.
Been hearing that we’re looking at, Stephen O’Donnell.
Is he a right back?
Canny tell yeez who telt me, coz yeez’ll grass them in.
Only saying.
………oot.
Zzzzzzzzzz
KEVJUNGLE
He was at Celtic, we let him go a quite a few years ago..
2012 maybe??
The £50m carrot is there, wether we like it or not. However, to get it we have to improve on the defence and a centre back and right back are essential. Alternatively, we need to coach the team on how to park the bus away from home and play for scraps.