The elimination of Aston Villa and Borussia Dortmund from the Champions League last night assures that the winner of this season’s tournament will already have qualified from their domestic league. As a result, Greek champions Olympiacos will automatically qualify for the league stage of next season’s tournament. This leaves one more seeded space open for Celtic.
Five teams will be seeded in the playoff round. Bodo/Glimt and Red Star have a higher coefficients than Celtic and will both be seeded. Ferencvaros have clawed back a deficit and are a point ahead in Hungary with six to play; I expect them to take the title. That leaves us chasing two seeded places.
The challenges from Salzburg (5 adrift, 7 to play) and Shakhtar Donetsk (10 adrift, 7 to play with a game in hand) and Dinamo Zagreb (7 down and 7 to play) do not look like they will materialise.
The most interesting European league this season could arguably be in Switzerland. You will remember Young Boys were 10th in their domestic table and bottom of the Champions League when we needed a late own goal to beat them in January.
That we struggle to much against a ‘poor’ side was a concern. It transpired that Young Boys had just got their act together and were about to embark on what looked like a run to the Swiss title. Two weeks ago they had closed the gap on leaders Basel to three points with eight to play.
A draw at home to 11th placed Yverdon popped the bubble, however. That was followed by a 5-0 battering at Luzern. The eight point gap now looks beyond them.
As it stands, we will be fourth of five seeds in the Champions League playoff round. The preparatory work should be well underway.
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As we split I would say it´s…..
Brain 4 Brawn 2
Celtic Hibs Dundee Utd St Mirren Thems Aberdeen
Best place Scottish football has been for some time with Murderwell and Hearts blooter merchants bubbling under.
More scots players than ever playing in foreign leagues as well….UEFA are you watching!!
which left back , better than greg taylor did we not purchase ?
is it now 7 different left backs tried but coulldnt better the bhoy ?
worrying about the play off and transfers before we even conclude this years competitions, it allows a negativity to seep in that is unwelcome and unnessesary.
distraction is not needed for now.
next people will complain about brendand spending money but not signing an extended contract.
dearie me, all so predictable.
Thant awkward moment when you realise that as we speak there are 2 ways our Glasgow rival could achieve direct qualification into next years CL and none for Celtic.
Ffs. It’s huns quick news time.
Burnley78 on 16th April 2025 2:50 pm
Thant awkward moment when you realise that as we speak there are 2 ways our Glasgow rival could achieve direct qualification into next years CL and none for Celtic.
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what two ways is that ?
if you say winning the europa, then aye, and even a story circulating today, that is they win it it is worth 60m euros,
talk about moonbeams,
and with a takover that is going to pump millions and millions into the playing staff.
well our generation of domination is over, finito, terminado,
leading to brendan walking out and neil starting a historic 3rd term.
ochone ochone, the sky is afalling in.
I’m not worried. I’m just amazed at the blind optimism some have for the close season.
The “plan” we expect every year never materialises.
Bilbao is a city under seige today.
all police and emergency service leave has been cancelled, and they bring is reservists from the gaurds.
the locals have high expectation of a win, especially as the final is to be held in bilbao.
they are also prepared for trouble. for some reason they think the travelling supportis a concern.
timmy7_noted on 16th April 2025 2:55 pm
I’m not worried. I’m just amazed at the blind optimism some have for the close season.
The “plan” we expect every year never materialises.
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The plan i would suggest does not align in any way with supporters expectations for timeliness.
Supporters were concerned we would lose the league by not back filling Kyogo.
And concerned we didnt backfill because we kwen we would beat Bayern so why bother with another CF.
I could argue that the board said “but brendan you have a £9m striker who scored twice at villa, why dont you play him ?
anyways, lets get the other trophies in the cabinet first.
* wouldnt beat bayern.
glendalystonsils on 16th April 2025 1:33 pm
I remember Liam Brady saying that Signing Stuart Slater was the last piece in his master plan jigsaw.
That made me laugh, I forgot he said that, tbh LB was a good example of great player but very limited manager!
Surely a club the size of Celtic can walk and talk at the same time? Are we so lacking in talent outwith the first 11 and Brendan? Our wage bill would suggest otherwise.
Wait till the season ends quickly becomes wait till the window closes which then becomes we tried our best and ends with two loan deals from England who turn out to be shite.
It’s groundhog day.
I hope I’m getting pelters for being wrong come July.
Of the 4 scottish teams in the top six with the brain factor, three of the managers are Irish and the other is a scot….well he’s from Edinburgh. So when it comes to where to look to find the best managers then it’s a no brainer.
I’ll leave it at that for now.
Didn’t take long for the Brendan haters to start their hand grenades
Scottish FA president Mike Mulraney has initiated discussions on a shared stadium of between 3,000 to 5,000 spectators for Celtic, Rangers and Glasgow City’s women’s teams in a push to accelerate the growth of the game ahead of Scotland co-hosting the 2035 Women’s World Cup. (The Herald), external
Rangers have earned around £13m for their participation and performance in the Europa League this season and that could rise to £60m should they reach the final and win it. (The National), external
Bilbao police have cancelled all leave ahead of this week’s Europa League quarter-final between Rangers and Athletic Club as they mount a major security operation and prepare to welcome more than 5,000 fans of the Glasgow club to the Basque city. (Glasgow Times)
Saint Stivs on 16th April 2025 2:54 pm
I’ll join you in the “what two ways is that ?” question. Unless I’m missing something, I can only think of one 🤷
Saint Stivs – we can agree to differ. I do not believe Adam Idah is good enough to be our no.1 striker. Maeda has shown much more goal prowess in his time as CF than Adam ever has. At Celtic, scoring 25-30 goals a season used to be the norm for our strikers. Adam has scored some big goals, I agree. But he also has played in plenty of games where he has contributed next to nothing and is posted missing when the ball goes along the 6-yard line where he is supposed to be.
All about opinions, I know. If someone offers 9 million for him I think he’ll be out the door like a shot.
Work on recruitment should certainly be under way …but as per we will wait and wait until we sell first it’s what we do …then the prices will inevitably rise ..
St Stivs
If they win the league. Or if they win the Europa.
Both totally unlikely of course but it is a wee quirk.
Rangers coefficient would place them above Olympiakos as they are ranked 25 in Europe if they had won our league.
Work on recruitment never stops – whether it bears fruit or not is the question
There are only really 2 benefits of a good coefficient : Seeding for play offs and this type of situation.
Seeding for leagues stages is no longer a benefit.
An Dun
Idah was an inspired Brendan choice at 11th hour of a window for a loan. He was not a strategic choice. He was not a recruitment team suggestion. Any options they presented were not deemed good enough by by BR.
As I said he was an inspired manager choice who justified this faith in the key goals he scored. Realistically no option could have been negotiated at the last minute for this one.
Signing him was a managers choice at the end of a window which Norwich milked our desperation. Sadly for many he has not delivered. Personally the jury is still out as he has scored some big and important goals and does have an impact. He has been playing in a team not always playing to his strength.
At worst I think we can get value from him in time.
We need to start planning now for pre-season. Scottish Cup Final is 24th May, International teams 31st May to 9th June. First preseason game Cork city 8 July. SPFL starts 1-3 August. CL play off 19th August. I dont have date for start of preseason training say 23rd June.
That means our Internationals having a 12 day gap 10-22 June. Which isnt much.
We could rest players once League is won Tannadice 26th April Final SPFL St Mirren 17th May. Some dont think this a good idea.
Transfer window is likely 16th June to 1st September with a pre-register period 1-10 June.
Either way planning is required
Board haters.
Brendan haters.
Yawn.
How long before Labour and SNP get chucked in?
Another yawn.
Good afternoon all from the Vicky Bar. A rainy day in old Glasgow Town. I don’t care, I feel champion. 👍
Burnley78
I was genuinely struggling with the second pathway until another poster mentioned it.
Winning the league? (Guffaw, Titter, Chortle).
Information without context is at best, less valuable, at worst insidious (Govt. responses to bad news saying they are spending £Xm full stop being good examples).
With that in mind – genuine polite ask …
What likelihood (percentage) would you ascribe to pathway 1 (Winning Europa) and Pathway 2 ?
Adam Idah’s ‘goals per game time’ is arguably better than Daizen Maeda’s ( that’s why I don’t bother too much with stats )
Good option to have in a young developing player already playing International level games and scoring. The huge majority of Daizen’s goals of course, were scored when he was playing left of centre including his goal against Sevco after Adam Idah had to come on to try a change, which worked to an extent.
Brendan has blown £30 millionish on Idah, Engels, Trusty, Khun, Nawrocki, etc, etc, etc.
And the answer is what?
Give Brendan tens of £millions more so that he can say that he never bought any of these new “iffy” players either?
How will this Toryesque spoiled brattism look if wee Fergie wins a European trophy with a dressing room full of stray Hun dugs?
The Huns chapped on the door of their second European trophy in the 2008 Europa League Final in Manchester.
The only Scottish club to win 2 European trophies were Aberdeen FC, when they were managed by big Fergie, what an achievement that was.
Then there was Dundee Utd, managed by Jim ( give me the Celtic job ) McLean, who only had a squad of 13 players yet he won the SPL in 1983, and in the next season he got Dundee Utd to the European Cup Semi Final only to be mibberied by Roma. And then only 2 seasons later, still with just 13 players, he got Dundee Utd to yet another European Final in the Uefa Cup only to be mibberied again, vs FC Gothenburg.
Just wow!
Then again the recently promoted Huns in 2022 Europa League Final in Seville, were Tims said that was only because of Covid!?!?
Tims believed the lying media and the lying krankie who was on the lying media “Live” for 2 hours every day, terrifying the innocent Scottish people to go get jabbed, without telling them what was in these untested, rushed through jabs.
Then when the innocent Sottish people, including huge numbers of Children started getting blood clots everywhere, high increase in the numbers of strokes, heart attacks, stage 4 incurable cancers which nobody has ever heard of before, huge numbers dying suddenly, or with short illness, and when relatives or victims themselves asked if all of this upsurge in sudden illness and deaths were jab related?
Then those doing the enquiring were removed from Doctor’s Surgeries, and from Hospital A & E Units , and were dismissed as “Anti Vaxxers” and banned from social media.
Youtube, Facebook and Joe Biden CIA FBI controlled Twitter were the worst of these supposedly “Alternative Media” outlets, which banned and pursued the arrest of innocent people who suspected they were being deceived into being harmed or worse, but they were persecuted for questioning the safety of the Vaccine?
And Celtic fans on blogs cheered on this Tyranny against innocent Citizens, even their own Celtic Comrades who don’t trust Media or Politicians, had to be banned as Timdom was now bathed in Wokeism, Cancel Kulture, Virtue Signalling, and grassing up their Comrades.
When did Celtic fans start believing the Media and Politicians and yet the Huns fans didn’t?
Anyway back at the boring tippy tappy possession sleep inducing football, yes then the Tims excused Ange and Brendan`s piss poor European campaigns by bawling their wee fearty lying eyes out saying “ITS NOT FAIR. SCOTTISH CLUBS CANT COMPETE WITH THESE BIG SUPER RICH EUROPEAN CLUBS. BOOHOO.”
Really?
So how did less than £20 million worth Rangers team defeat £200+ million worth Dortmund team to get to 2022 Europa League Final vs another mega £millon+ German team and lost the final thanks to Adam Ramsey missing the the Huns only penalty in the penalty kicks shoot out?
Put it another way. Had the Huns won a European trophy in Seville then Parkhead would still be half empty with lie after lie being told as to the reasons for those empty seats.
What if wee Fergie wins this seasons Europa League trophy without him even being allowed to bring in a single player of his own and having to make a team out of a dressing room full of Hun stray dugs?
What will the narrative be then?
How good will Celtic’s 55th tile look in the shadow of Rangers 2nd European trophy?
All of sudden wee Fergie becomes the Jock Stein of Ibrox and winning the only trophy he had a chance to compete for.
And Parkhead will have more annoying as fk cycle lanes than supporters, all of this madness voted for by Tims and other eejits.
And with today’s UK Supreme Court showing Humanity to Women in the destroyed societal degenerate swamp full of Women and Children haters and gleefully voted for by the worst collection of Tims in Celtic’s history.
Watch out as the The Woke Governments ( who always need victims ) will now double their efforts with cycle lanes around Parkhead and complicit lying sleekit cowardly Celtic PLC will say nothing and their sleekit fan base will keep voting for snp/greens Scumbaggery even if it means Celtic’s quickly emptying Parkhead stadium leading to administration and liquidation. Killed by dim Tims.
And dim idiots on Celtic blogs will be calling fans “Entitled” because they leave earlier and earlier to avoid the soon to be 3 to 4 hours of traffic jams because Timdom was seduced by the krankie kreature. FFS!
What a time to be alive.
PS, The Kelly and White board led Celtic FC to a European Cup in 1967, runner up in 1970, semi finalists hundreds of other times as well as, 9 League Titles in a row, etc, etc, etc, all whilst giving half the gate money away in each home game at Parkhead as well as allowing 30% of mainly young fans to be lifted over the turnstiles for free, and that might have been one of Thatchers reasons for getting her goons to cause the Hillsborough disaster in 1989 to get stadiums all seated, all ticket, all season ticket, all facial recognition ticket, all £1000 to £2000 smart phone as well as a soon to be £1000 basic season ticket with an average 3 mile walk to the stadium.
Thatcher has utterly destroyed society and football is certain to be next?!
Jings Crivens, back to the dark room with Hugh Keevins, the only other lapsed Tim who can see not only the Elephants already in the room, but the big giant raging Ones with attitudes on the big trucks racing down the track HUNting for dim Tims. Oh dear.
Re Stuart Slater being the final piece of the jigsaw
When he signed for Celtic someone said Slater’s nickname amongst a section of the West Ham support was “the jigsaw” because he went to pieces when he was in the box.
There were also stories of a West Ham fanzine called “Dicks Out”, so named because Julian of that ilk missed so many games due to injury and suspension.
Kevin and Hugh dark room pals
Wee fergie? Away n geeze peace ya mini man tit.
Hugh Kevins at it again.
GARYGILLESPIES 👍
Do you remember your own Monika’s nickname?
Kev J
Certainly an alternative to the MSM.
Not all alternatives are totally bonkers and deserve to be dismissed out of hand. 😀
I see a bad moon rising…..
BSR 😂
Yes.
The Rigger.
Some scurrilous suggestions of two weeks and four weeks off I believe.
Two weeks on