Neil Lennon has been fluid with his team formations in recent weeks. As a result, three central defenders, Efe Ambrose, Kelvin Wilson and Charlie Mulgew could each be regarded as first choice picks, although Ambrose and Mulgrew have also been deployed in midfield. Ambrose has featured in all nine games since the beginning of December, while Wilson has featured in eight and Mulgrew in seven.
Add to the picture the fact that fourth-choice central defender, Thomas Rogne, has appeared in eight of those nine games, missing only the replay against Arbroath, and our central defenders look curiously stretched. Much has been made of the proximity of Efe Ambrose potential involvement in the African Cup of Nations to Celtic’s Champions League tie with Juventus, but the numbers suggest a vacancy exists beyond this tie, hence the recruitment of Rami Gershon, who will join on a six month trial, pending a work permit, with a permanent transfer agreed in principle, pending performance between now and May.
Gershon, 24, has kicked around Standard Liege for three years without making a discernible impact, but he is an experienced international who fits the profile of a non-critical recruit, competing as fourth of fifth choice central defender. His six-month objective will be to secure Thomas Rogne’s place in next season’s squad. The try-before-you-buy strategy we discussed earlier this week will ensure Neil Lennon has a player keen to impress whenever he gets an opportunity. Sound squad management.
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Why is this all being rushed through anyway (in place for next season?).
Nothing to do with the Nimmo Smith enquiry?
If there is no longer an SPL (SPL and SFL will be merging, n’est-ce pas), then the onus for stripping titles (minimum punishment btw) shifts to, erm, em, … wouldn’t be oor Campbell, could it?
Sumthin’s starting to hum… odorously !
Gerry
They’ll start in the ‘National League’ of 18 if it is introduced from the coming season. Anything else is likely to cause goodness knows what damage.
The Battered Bunnet
17:43
A few years ago a sevcovian started at my work place. The first works night out he told me he was surprised by the number of Tims employed (not in a bitter way). I laughed at the time but it is an indicator of the way things were.
Having said that the same company use the facilities of of another company whose only Tim employee, as far as I’m aware, is the cleaner.
Yes, Woman are by far the most discriminated group by a long way, and despite years of fighting on their behalf the Unions didn’t push hard enough to get that sorted out until recently.
Pens
gerry
17:53 on 8 January, 2013
If based on finishing positions at the end of this season, and the new structure is in place by the beginning of next season, then they should be in the bottom league.
However, the devil will be in the detail.
Wouldn’t be surprised if there is a wee play off for the last place in the middle league between the champion of division 3 and runners up of division 2
Joe Filippis Haircut 17:54 on 8 January, 2013
“Is there any truth in the rumour that Sir swalex is interested in Fraser Forster does anyone know I heard it from another Celtic fan this afternoon ? H.H.”
What do you think, Joe? Do you think it’s true?
You know yer mate better than we do. Is he a stand up guy?
I don’t believe SevCo will be in the top 2 divisions IF the leagues are reconstructed for next season. Fans would desert the Scottish game in their thousands particularly at our own club. For that reason alone, i would think Celtic, Aberdeen, Hibs, DU etc will ensure that SevCo remain in the 18 team division.
Anything else, and its La Liga + Serie A for me for the rest of my life
Ernie Lynch
Ah suppose you too.. share the same Wayward opinion which
Robert Tressell..holds..
Concerning the True Identity of ..”The Singing Detective”???
Well, let me tell you,kid..
That make you
Anither
Callow Fellow..
Who is Being Duped
Great..
‘
That news…, will also.. continue tae Amuse Me.
Kojo
Still.. Laughin’
Joe Filippis Haircut
17:54
Doubt it, unless purely as a backup keeper?
Bookie
Joe F-rumours Real Madrid want de Gea.
kilgore trout
17:19 on
8 January, 2013
MORE challenging!!
(Can’t type and stand up at the same time.)
…………..
Even more impressive if yir actually a trout!
Look out for men who wear brown brogues and hide behind the living room curtains.
STR. I have no idea if its true or not I do think though that big Fraser performances will bring interest from English clubs,However, I hope he is with us a bit longer before we cash in. H.H.
Singing Tec
Al Jazeera has been turned by the americanos . Bush wanted to bomb it off the face of the earth but more cunning advisors suggested infiltrateing .
Now that news station , which in the past gave the other side of the story, is just a middle-of the road puppet, being worked by the CIA.
Sir Matt Busby was interested in Jimmy Johnstone
McGroryofCeltic CSC
Ten men- I could be wrong but i think PL would like the huns back sooner rather than later.DD didn’t seem against it either,going by his comments a few weeks back.
Corkcelt
I agree with you, don’t think for one minute that the rest of the clubs would let them leapfrog a division, think we are getting annoyed at something that wont happen
but if it did, it would be Armageddon
Joe Filippis Haircut 18:04 on 8 January, 2013
No chance any of our top, first-team regulars, players will leave this month.
We may lose a couple in the summer, but we should get decent money for them at least.
The Battered Bunnet
I think the fact I was in the public sector run from London from the off was a factor in my experience but my four kids, now adults are all working in private sector and had no problems, which suggests things have improved.
Jabba has spoken in his new role as voice of the zombies
THE shape of things to come, three divisions of 12-12-18, has been agreed in principle.
This abomination will now be pulled and stretched by selected members of the SPL and SFL in a desperate attempt to make it more presentable.
Good luck with that.
It would be easier trying to iron out the lines on the face of the old broad, Madge, in Benidorm.
12-12-18. It’s ridiculous, especially when you remember the two 12s will fragment into three eights.
Yet this time supporters will just have to buy into it. Whatever happened to that new and bold notion that fans were all important?
It isn’t that long ago clubs, particularly those in the top flight, were solemnly insisting that ignoring the views of fans would be akin to financial suicide.
Remember? It was when the game was wrestling with the problem of what to do with Rangers.
All the clubs were squealing that the wishes of fans had to be granted. If you swallowed any of that bilge you probably also believed in sporting integrity.
Of course it was all nonsense. Sporting Integrity was a cloak of convenience, albeit a rather thin, practically transparent one, behind which club leaders huddled together to come up with sanctions.
Rangers had to be punished, they deserved to be punished but it seemed as if additional penalties were being randomly introduced depending on who was in which meeting.
Many Rangers fans like to think the frenzy to cause the club as much additional pain as possible was driven by one club but that wasn’t strictly the case. Many fans of many clubs waded in but this is not to say Celtic fans or their club didn’t attempt to influence the outcome of debates on Rangers and possible sanctions.
Of course they did. And they are still at it on social media sites and on blogs clattered out by individuals who are no better than semi-literate.
The sheer hypocrisy of what is happening within Hampden’s corridors of power right now will be lost on them but let’s not pretend sporting integrity or the wishes of supporters really are important to all those clubs pushing for this change.
If they were listening to fans they wouldn’t be sticking with a top division of 12 , and if there was any integrity there would be no rush to bring in changes for the start of next season.
If, as seems likely, the structure is altered for 2013-14 supporters won’t get what they’ve already paid for, especially those following teams striving for promotion. Actually this entire season will be rendered meaningless.
Sporting integrity won’t merely be compromised, it’ll be crushed but this is what happens when desperation slips in and throttles reason.
This belief won’t sit well with the few who are more or less running the SPL and influencing thinking within that desperate organisation but they can’t complain. After all, they’ve dismissed Rangers’ views completely.
This club, the biggest one in the country, were not invited to take part in talks which will shape the game’s future.
We are then entitled to conclude that this club are not important, which is strange indeed when so many fans of other clubs continue to be obsessed by Rangers, who are simply getting on with their own affairs asking no favour from anyone.
We do, however, expect commonsense to be applied, along with fair play.
Look, Rangers will return to the top flight, which will of course have to be rebranded. Rangers will take a seat at the head of the table where, despite the latest insult of being shut out of reconstruction talks, we will act with the good of Scottish football in mind.
We’ll work through the divisions and we will return stronger and better than ever before.
This club accepted their sanctions and moved on but too many others have been unable to do the same. They continue their assaults and while the deranged, who are using social media sites as conduits for their twisted agendas, should be ignored there are more than a few in the mainstream still maligning the club at every opportunity.
In a BBC radio debate last Saturday night one pundit, in a matter-of-fact manner, said Charles Green speaks with ‘forked tongue.’ No attempt to explain or justify the statement, just as no explanation was offered when another radio voice claimed there was a dishonesty about Walter Smith when he went public with a late bid for the club.
Word of advice gentlemen. From now on be very careful when talking or writing about this club.
To paraphrase something said about another club, Rangers will not be treated less than others. And although there is no desire to pick fights, be assured that no one will attack Rangers with impunity.
Better, however, to quote Bill Struth: ‘Never fear, inevitably we shall have our years of failure and when they arrive, we must reveal tolerance and sanity. You do that, you will emerge stronger than before.’
Tolerance and sanity. That’s what Rangers will demonstrate and maintain, especially when back at the summit.
After all, someone has to. 12-12-18. Dear God.
A Sevcopath who got an Amazon voucher for Christmas, is still trying to order two piranha fish.
Kayal33,
The SPL will cease to exist once it merges with the SFL – so Green can say he has kept his word if they make it to the top division.
With no restructuring they would be in the third tier next season – surely even their managerial genius can’t fail to win the third division?
With a restructuring they should be in the third tier of the new set up. But that would make the rest of the third division season meaningless, and offer no reward to its winners. I’m sure we will begin to see mentions of how unfair this would be coming very soon.
“Unfair to any team of course, I mean, we’re not just saying this because it’s The Rangers, no its about fairness …”
!!Bada Bing!!
I thought that DD just told them what they wanted to hear
And The CIA…..
Are Just Another Middle-Of-The-Road Organisation…
Being Worked By The Muslim Brotherhood….
And Their Splinter Group…Al Qaeda….
In This Increasingly Dystopian World…
That We Currently Inhabit…..
Pinkety…?
Celtic’s home game v Dundee Utd is now on Tues, January 22 (KO: 7.45pm), and away game v St Johnstone now on Tues, February 19 (KO: 7.45pm).
Robert Tressell
I completely
Dis-Believe.. yer claim..
That
Ye wull Continue tae
IGNORE.. Ma Submissions tae this Sainted Neighbourhood.
Ye are talking wi a Forked Tongue,kiddo… when ye make that statement
Na..
On the Contrary.,.
‘
You Wull Continue tae Avidly Read each AND EVERY..
Single wan o’ Ma Contributions..
Howevah……..
.. Ye must be careful.. tae keep THAT .. quiet..
So..
Mak sure Ye Dinnae
Reply, tae This Particular Wan..
Or
Ye wull gie Yersel..
A
Big Riddy.
Right?
Kojo
Still, Laughin’
dead and loving it – Possibly mate,but i think the Board want them back asap.
Kayal33
18:08
PMSL :))))))))))))
Bookie
Jabba’s writings on the SevCo website virtually confirm that they will be in the league of 18 next season
“Watch what you write about us” etc. Hilarious stuff
Is Jabba the new Leggo?
Spiers on Sport: this 12-12-18 ‘ugly duckling’ looks good to me
It is a calculated risk being taken by the SPL/SFA to advocate a new 12-12-18 structure for league football in Scotland.
The risk is significant, given the level of public hostility towards it. Unless I have been hallucinating, poll upon poll appears to have shown that Scottish football fans want a bigger top league of 16 teams.
So here is the kiss of death to 12-12-18. I quite like it. I think it could work.
I accept what David Longmuir, chief-executive of the SFL, has said: 12-12-18 is a complicated model, not easily digested at first. But this minor glitch shouldn’t stand in the way of the plan being pursued, if enough clubs vote for it in three weeks’ time.
The proposal is still being fine-tuned but it offers a number of advantages, not least – for those frustrated clubs like Dunfermline, Morton, Partick Thistle, Raith Rovers and even a Queen of the South – a much greater opportunity to gain access to the top flight in Scotland.
In this new format, the top two divisions of 12 would split into three mini leagues of 8 after 22 matches – provisionally named the Super 8, the Play-Off 8 and the National 8.
The top group would play a further 14 matches, to battle it out for the league title and European slots. Fair enough.
Arguably, though, it would be the Play-Off 8 and the National 8 which would be the most interesting and dramatic.
The Play-Off 8 would consist of the bottom four teams from the top tier of 12 and the top four teams from the middle tier of 12, to fight it out over 14 matches for four slots in the following season’s top division.
That is quite an opportunity for those clubs who rightly argue that, with its one-down, one-up system from 12, the current SPL is almost hermetically sealed off. For them, this model represents their big chance.
Even the National 8 would have its appeal. As things stand, the proposal is that, over 14 games, eight clubs would play to avoid being one of four clubs dumped into the bottom tier of 18 for the following season.
In other words, four clubs would also get the chance to be promoted from the bottom tier (18) to the middle tier (12) each season. That is quite an invite.
It is not a perfect model – none which has been proposed is. But 12-12-18 does meet a lot of criteria: number of games over a season, money, and not least the scope for upward mobility among many of Scotland’s “excluded” clubs.
If the pyramid principle can also be introduced at the bottom, all the better, I say. Let meritocracy flourish.
As for the “Rangers question” – the suspicion about league reconstruction being a mere front to hasten Rangers’ return to the top – the 12-12-18 model is in the clear on that.
As things stand, it will take three winning years – starting August 2012 – for Rangers to return to the top league. Under the new 12-12-18 proposal, a successful Rangers could not work their way back up through the divisions any quicker – it would still take a minimum of three years.
One perennial weakness in 12-12-18 is that the top 8 – the so-called Super 8 – might end up being pretty dull if Celtic are romping away with the title.
This is one more reason – though many appear to hate this sentiment being expressed – why I believe a revived Rangers cannot get back to the top of Scottish football quick enough.
What Rangers have done is wrong – not least this club’s own self-destruction – but the Scottish game needs a title race as often as possible.
I’ve really enjoyed the SPL this season so far, but the campaign is diminished by Rangers’ absence. It is impossible to suggest otherwise. And one thing the legislators cannot change is the unwieldy wealth of Glasgow’s big two.
Everyone agrees change in Scottish football is needed. I say let’s give 12-12-18 a chance. It’s as good as I’ve seen.
jabba the hun
Traynor rears his ugly head and calls the SGA/SPL as “hypocrites”………his utterings will be turned on their head at every turn.
*SFA
FFs same old same old on here IF you dont like reading Kojo scroll on past.
Hows things btw Kojo ? i always try my best to try and make out what you’re saying but i struggle with one or 2 of “yir wurds” -)))
Sheik Yerbouti
18:21
Jibber jabba the hun.
My dear,dear,dear,friend..The Singing Detective.
Pal..
Every buddy, who his an Ounce o’ Mallam
Knows that Mr. Obama is a Closet… MUSLIM.
He was Brought up in that FAITH.. BY HIS
Indonesian Father.
Jist today.. In an Arab Periodical..
there is the Revelation..
the the Obama Administration has Bin Penetrated by the
Muslim Brotherhood..
This Story goes oan tae Name
SEVEN ..important Members of the Brotherhood.. who have bin appointed by
Mr..Obama Tae Key Positions…in his Administration
This Periodical..
‘
goes as Far..as Naming These Seven Infiltrators..
Yep..
This Is beginning tae get serious,folks…
The sad Part is.. Palomine..
That it appears that Only
You and I…and ???
Are isolated.. Smart cookies… who see whit is going oan
on this Sainted Blog.
AND
are aware of the Muslim Threat…
which is Nothing lesa… than
World Domination..
If .. they are not .. Stopped.
Kojo
yer pal.. who likes ye aloater.
Still, Laughin
Could the following section of Jabba’s writings be libellous?
“but this is not to say Celtic fans or their club didn’t attempt to influence the outcome of debates on Rangers and possible sanctions”
Any of our m’learned friends on here able to advise?
Oh boy – is McIntyre hurting or what? You can hear the pain in his voice. Reading out texts from one side only.
Billy Bragg@billybragg
If this isn’t class war, I don’t know what is. The Tories set the working poor against the unemployed pic.twitter.com/TUOTSpcf