I looked into the world of Scottish football betting yesterday. Betting on Celtic to win the Scottish Premiership is less rewarding than putting your money in an interest bearing account, which, I suspect, is an approximation of what bookmakers will do with any such bets. In short, our league is not so much a sport as a secure investment.
Betting gets really interesting if you meander onto what is referred to as the Without Celtic market, or who will win the league if Celtic are taken out of the equation. Favourites are Aberdeen, closely followed by Motherwell and then Dundee United and Hibs (hmm….).
Can you imagine what a league title like this would do for these clubs? Aberdeen, Motherwell and United actually vying to become champions?
Some hold a notion that Celtic are the great benefactors of Scottish football, which is dependent on you and me for the occasional home game and TV money. This is rubbish. Celtic inhibits Scottish football more than we can imagine. We are a competitive poison making it impossible for historically significant football teams to thrive.
Keeping a clean sheet away from home is an achievement for any team. Doing so twice, in Europe, and winning both games, is outstanding for St Johnstone. Well done. I can only imagine their absence from the top of the Without Celtic betting chart is a result of bookmakers anticipating their run to the Europa League final in Turin will hinder their league challenge.
I have to express my sheer delight at yesterday’s pronouncement by the chief executive of Rangers International FC PLC, Craig Mather. We can be confident of this guy’s credentials and that he is worthy of following in the footsteps of Charles Green, Tommy Cooper and other comedic greats.
Mather issued a statement on the club’s web site noting punishments handed out to Hearts and Dunfermline for entering administration were different from the punishment handed out to Rangers International’s predecessor club (the player registrations and current penalties Newco Rangers were allowed to inherit) – for a completely different series of offences.
Those penalties were imposed for a variety of misdemeanours, including failure to declare the club appointed a director who had been struck off, failure to comply with stock market rules and multiple counts of bringing the game into disrepute. The SFA disciplinary panel responsible for the penalties found that “only match fixing in its various forms might be a more serious breach”.
Would you not feel a wee bit embarrassed by this? Mr Mather asks for clarification but I suggest we don’t trouble him by directing him to the aforementioned SFA panel’s ruling. Better that he operates in the version of reality he is most comfortable with, and that he keeps his followers away from looking into the real issues……..
To that effect, our thanks to all the media outlets who unquestioningly reported the Mather comments without hint of irony, apart from those pesky online types at STV, who had the temerity to address the question. Cease and desist immediately.
Flag Day tomorrow, another historic moment in Celtic history. Get in early, or late afternoon, as it happens. Hoping to see some of our new guys make their claim for a start in Sweden.
[calameo code=0003901713852289beccb lang=en page=70 hidelinks=1 width=100% height=500]
1,352 Comments- Pages:
- «
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- ...
- 36
- »
.
Courtesy The Guardian..
Scottish Premiership preview 2013-14
Renaming a troubled product cannot mask obvious failings for Scottish Professional Football League
Neil Lennon will be aiming to secure Celtic’s third consecutive league title. Photograph: Danny Lawson/PA
The recent European victory for St Johnstone over Rosenborg offered a reminder of Scottish football’s importance and a stark snapshot of how far it has tumbled. The Perth team’s aggregate win, highly impressive though it was, arrived in the second qualifying round of the Europa League. Scotland has slipped so low down the European radar that its clubs now play qualifiers as routine against clubs they could once treat with disdain.
The level of national exuberance that met St Johnstone’s win highlighted other things; namely how desperate this nation has become for any kind of success and that a generation of supporters have no knowledge of a time when teams had a significant standing in Europe. Celtic’s Champions League exploits last season were wonderful and Rangers’ run to the Uefa Cup final of 2008 shouldn’t be forgotten, but elsewhere failure has become an unhappy commonplace.
Perhaps the most endearing and notable aspect of St Johnstone’s home leg was the attendance of 7,850. By the end of last season’s Scottish Premier League, St Johnstone had an average home crowd of just 3,640.
For all the game’s glaring failings, Scotland remains a football-obsessed country. This weekend marks the official start of the Scottish Professional Football League, a body again encompassing all four divisions, and the latest opportunity for those in charge to capitalise on that interest – just as St Johnstone, and other clubs, have done sporadically – by re-engaging with those who have become suitably dissatisfied to vote with their feet. Scottish football, in simple terms, is wildly overpriced and blatantly lacking in imagination either on or off the pitch.
Players no longer ooze class, with those who do display even a hint of such ability quickly whisked south of the border. At international level, Gordon Strachan cannot call upon a clutch of reliable centre-backs or centre-forwards.
It may seem churlish to open a “new era” with negatives but it would also be folly to ignore the obvious. The SPL has been renamed and rebranded, but it lacks a title sponsor and will be run by the same people who have presided over years of stagnation. For too long, self-interest has dominated at the expense of paying customers; a matter rightly pointed out by the refreshing voice of Ross County’s chairman, and a successful businessman, Roy MacGregor.
Other administrators have insisted time and again that it is no longer legitimate to compare Scottish football with England because of an ever-growing financial gulf. It was almost beyond parody, therefore, as the SPFL unveiled the names of their divisions as Premiership, Championship, League One and League Two.
Newly introduced playoffs between the first and second tiers have been hailed as the most impressively radical development for the new season. It was the closed-shop, exclusion mentality of the SPL that pushed so many clubs towards financial oblivion. Some have never fully recovered.
Celtic will win the Premiership, their third in a row, and once again at a canter. Current intrigue in Glasgow’s east end surrounds whether the club’s board of directors are content to retain a squad that is guaranteed to return that domestic success or will spend meaningful cash in order to boost hopes of a return to the Champions League’s group phase.
Victor Wanyama and Gary Hooper have left and top players will not choose Scotland as their ideal place of work but Celtic revelled in their European run last season and, clearly, want more of the same. Neil Lennon insists that winning the title remains his managerial priority but there is a mundane element associated with doing precisely that that is offset by Champions League occasions.
Spending money would not guarantee a return to Europe’s top table, and Celtic’s business model is unquestionably strong, but supporters want to see ambition in return for their costly season tickets. Celtic still need a centre-forward, a centre-back and a ball-playing midfielder.
At the bottom of the table, things are not quite as clear cut, but it would still require a minor miracle for Hearts to overcome the 15-point penalty they suffered for entering administration. That deduction would be harmful enough in isolation but they also have a signing embargo and a playing squad that is preciously low on experience, scoring threats and physicality. Their best hope, which cannot be discounted, may be that another club suffers an insolvency during the coming months.
Hearts’ city neighbours, Hibernian, suffered the humiliation of a 7-0 home Europa League defeat to Malmo since which, inexplicably, Pat Fenlon has remained as the manager. Fenlon’s tenure is surely doomed – the malaise lies somewhere else at Easter Road – but he has made useful additions in the form of Owain Tudur Jones and Rowan Vine. The £200,000 Hibs paid Swindon Town for James Collins represented an almost unheard of case of a team not called Celtic spending a six-figure transfer fee.
Aberdeen’s perennial hope for better things has been boosted by the arrival of a manager with hunger in the form of Derek McInnes. The former Rangers midfielder endured a troubled time in charge of Bristol City and has therefore returned to Scotland seeking to relight what had earlier seemed a promising coaching career. McInnes’s first task will be to improve on Aberdeen’s harmful habit of producing scoreless draws at Pittodrie.
Motherwell have lost their key striker, Michael Higdon, but Stuart McCall can be content with a batch of useful signings that include Stephen McManus, John Sutton, Iain Vigurs and James McFadden. With that in mind, they seem the most legitimate bet for second place in a race that will be keenly fought.
Partick Thistle and Dundee United will kick off the supposedly bright new dawn on Friday evening in the west end of Glasgow. Hard as they may try to brand it otherwise, the nine months thereafter will almost inevitably produce more of the same.
Summa
Dear Challs,
Welcome back ,we have really missed you.
PS-You don’t know embdae with a spare bus,do you?
Afternoon all, I see some of the easily offended are up in arms regarding Angela Haggerty’s column.
This is the same woman who wrote at length about the ‘riot’ of Dens Park.
Her sensationalism stinks of a desire to attain a higher profile in the MSM.
MikeinToronto – If you’re looking in this morning, i saw yer post yesterday mate; always a pleasure to spend some time with you. I knew you’d love that guys at the restaurant, i’ve been going there for 26 years. I’ll try and get the movie this weekend. Look forward to seeing it.
slainte
tony
Hamiltontim
She also has a half naked pic of Samaras on her twitter
HH
.
HamiltonTim..
I am Surprised at Your..Anti SwedishPhysioIsm..;-))))
Summa
Seems that Aye Broke is closing by instalments.
Feckin’ shame isn’t it?
traditionalist88
Bottom half?
.
HT..
Also..
I Am Easily Ascended..
Summa
Trad88/Summa
Rarely does she say anything positive about Celtic which is kinda strange for a Celtic supporter.
She’d fit in well on CQN :-)
The Spirit of Arthur Lee
Careful now;)
HH
Brilliant 2nd for Khano’s Ghirl
LB
I have to laugh at the suggestion that having a pin-up of someone (Samaras) is equivalent to making sexual catcalls to a stranger.
HT
Who let you out your hutch ya trouble maker? :-)
Green Lantern (((((0))))) 14:25
Seems that Aye Broke is closing by instalments.
Feckin’ shame isn’t it?
Bryson says that since a safety certificate was handed out, even if the stadium was not safe at that point, because the certificate was given it is deemed to be safe.
tomtheleedstim
12:57 on
2 August, 2013
http://news.stv.tv/west-central/234830-former-chief-charles-green-returns-to-rangers-in-consultant-role/
———————————————————-
Pigs & Troughs spring to mind
malarkey
14:32 on 2 August, 2013
I have to laugh at the suggestion that having a pin-up of someone (Samaras) is equivalent to making sexual catcalls to a stranger.
————
You don’t see a connection between the two???
Che
Wifi for about an hour so just thought I’d pop in and be friendly :-)
minx1888 As someone who knows you I agree that you would indeed challenge any type of person who you felt crossed a line. I was in the Jock Stein lower 138 and all I heard was some wolf whistles, in fact I think some of them were aimed at the sub that came on with the bun in his hair as he was warming up. I have been following your little tet a tet with Miss Haggerty this morning and I wholly agree with you re confronting or reporting. As she often sys that she confronts others in her journalistic role then why not do so when as she said she witnessed the sexist remarks.
Keep on doing what you do best minx18888
KTF
HH
malarkey
14:32 on 2 August, 2013
I have to laugh at the suggestion that having a pin-up of someone (Samaras) is equivalent to making sexual catcalls to a stranger.
————
You don’t see a connection between the two???
————
No. It’s a ludicrous comparison.
Malarkey
14:32 on
2 August, 2013
Both are objectifying the target. Having a pin-up of Samaras is just as wrong as having a pin-up of a Swedish Physiotherapist.
Paul67 et al
Well, the well may have been poisoned but we did not poison it. (Didn’t start the fire either all you Billy Joel fans out there). Fact is had there been an Alex Ferguson, Jim McLean or even a Xabi Laslo out there last season, Neil Lennon would have struggled for third place last season. Were Aberdeen supported in any way, shape or form by an industry that has generated £billions for the British economy, and had a modern coach, (as opposed to a recycled one) they could challenge Celtic within a few seasons. But, they have postponed their new stadium and show less ambition than St. Johnstone, and will probably not do so. Not a lot Celtic can do in the short-term, but try to play the kind of attractive football that we would all like to see.
Eric Murphy
celticquicknews@gmail.com
One to many 8’s there sorry
KTF
HH
HT
The wee brothers stag do tomorrow afternoon, what eejit would arrange that on the same day Celtic are st home.
unfurling the league flag?
As for Ms Haggerty if she had a photograph of the Swedish physios on her page I’d consider joining twitter.
HT
How’s the holidays ?
Greengo returns to Sevco
Obvious no one can shaft the fans quite like Charlie
Stupid stupid Huns
Goooooood afternoon from another, different, hun- free mountain. Hot as hades here but, as I said, hun- free. Having said that if I were not here then it would be Tim- free also. But it ain’t. Currently.
Finally managed to get wifi, had a good old read back and what do I find? Well we beat the Swedes, St Johnstone continue to shine, Motherwell continue to show why they have manager of the year. The nubile physios have caused a stir and Chuckles is back.
Hamiltontim has started stirring it and is lending weight to the argument that the school holidays are too long ;-)) and theoriginalsadiesbhoy is arguing with everyone like a Donegal barroom brawler trailing his coat.
I expect 3 points from Ross County and will want to know the reason why if we get anything else.
Ah well, back to swatting mosquitoes.
HH
Cilentocoastcsc
Both are objectifying the target. Having a pin-up of Samaras is just as wrong as having a pin-up of a Swedish Physiotherapist.
——-
Huh?
Did anyone say there was anything wrong with pin-ups? (the answer is no).
Her complaint was about crude sexual barracking. I wasn’t there so have no idea of the truth or otherwise of this.
Just seen the MEP for Coventry on SSN,is he/she had a sex change? Serious question.
Finboggason in for say €5 (would be a good price) and later sold for £5-10m on £10-15k a week or Doyle for £1m on probably £20k a week?
I know who I’d rather.
Difference in wages would probably be £1m over 3 years and Doyle would have no resale.
The Token Tim
Got your email and have replied to it.
~SPF~
.
How Many of the Fans Who say they Would Shout down Sexism in Paradise..
Shouted Down Sammi-ism when it was Rife..ie.45,000 Peeps week in week out in Paradise..
Discuss..
Summa
Oh and Hooper’s gone. Yes he had an impact in big games but I will be spared having to watch his lazy displays in domestic league games. Derk? Derk?? What kind of name is that? Hope you score a barrow load son!!
Ciao ciao!!
Women suffering crude sexual barracking at a fitba match …who’d have thunk it
This PC world bursts my trumpet at times
Humour bypass in progress ,off oot.
summa
No the same thing, however I agree.
Afternoon bhoys for a hot hot hot hun free mountain valley.
So Chuckie has returned, magic.
I also noticed that the leggless loon is also back, fair changed his tune over the summer, Chuck was the anti christ a few weeks ago.
He is continuing with the lies to the hoards as well, telling them that uefa has said the huns are the same club etc, deluded is what deluded are.
Dr. Whatfor
No bad theses hun free mountains >}
HH