Playing three at the back creates a specific role for the wingback. Wilfried Nancy had Alistair Johnston on the right when the pair were at Montreal. Johnston’s pace, endurance and ability to cross from the byline is perfect for this formation.
Alistair’s return is months away, so the manager will need to come up with an alternative to reinvigorate our right side which has been poor all season. We don’t have a perfect facsimile. Anthony Ralston can hit the line and cross, Colby Donovan has energy, but we have only seen a small sample size.
Yang is the best crosser at the club (oh yes he is), but he is not a wingback. Similarly, there is nothing I can see in Daizen Meada that suggests he is a better option through the middle than Johnny Kenny. Daizen, though, has the energy and pace to play wingback, he is an obvious choice to move wide.
As we discussed yesterday, playing Daizen in front of Kieran Tierney, with Auston Trusty in the middle and Liam Scales left, is a better deployment of resources than Sunday’s lineup.
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Turkeybhoy Khun and Kyogo. The bored pulled someone’s pants down. Glad they are not still here for collective abuse. Failed to replace yes it’s not an easy game, look at the dross the Americans bought over in poundland. Let’s just see how the next two windows go.
CHAIRBHOY on 9TH DECEMBER 2025 10:24 PM
UCL Results tonight…
Bayern Munich 3 – 1 Sportin Lisbon
Atalanta 2 – 1 Chelsea
We went to Bergamo and Munich last season, we were at that level.
What this Board has done to our “Club” is a disgrace.
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7 of the team that started in Bergamo should be available for us on Thursday- Kasper, Trusty, Scales, CalMac, Hatate,Engels & Maeda.
Two of the subs that night in McCowan and Bernardo should be available. We’ve got KT to add to this year’s mix too.
So I’m expecting a similar level of performance in terms of defensive organisation and cohesiveness as we seen that night in Bergamo.
Maestro from earlier…
JSP wasn’t included in the squad remember so cannot play.
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Are you trying to educate the self-proclaimed football managers on here?
😜
HH
Dessybhoy @ 7:43 pm
Woods was on the bench on Sunday, when will Celtic wil announce it or say thanks? World Class dont you know.
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TML @ 10:11 pm
Stevie Woods has NOT left Celtic. That’s this week’s fake news. What will it be next week? Whatever it is, the usual gullibles will buy it and Celtic FC will get it in the neck once again.
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Now, now Tom.
Let’s not upset these great “supporters” of our club. In the the midst of their positivity an’ all…
HH
CMG
You seem to be well informed on Woods,hope you’re right.
Dessybhoy
If you read my post again, you will find that Tom provided the information on Woods.
Time will tell if this is fake news or not.
What I personally choose not to do, is take unconfirmed rumours and use them as a stick to beat the club that I support.
HH
Good Morning Fholk – Grand Day To Be A Tim…
Larkin1907 @ 11:12 pm,
Yes, the experience of the Lions combined with the exuburence of the quality street gang – a few smart signings and a team of legends.
No too shabby management team there as well.
They could well have done greater things in Europe.
Hail Hail
I think some fans need to realise that supporting the manager and team does not mean that you support the board. Have a read at some of the headlines in the MSM at the vitriol aimed at WN. Even picking up on the fact that he was wearing green trainers. We shouldn’t be contributing to the pile on as it will not help the manager succeed.
An Dún @ 6:59 am,
Yes, that’s a very good point, we can’t be that far away.
There are seventeen clubs in that UEL table within three points of each other.
It is all to play for and I’m sure the team will be up for it – it could be a statement win by the new management team.
Hail Hail
CMG
And how could the club do more to fill in the information vacuum that exists on club personnel?
And other things
Paul The Spark on 10th December 2025 7:57 am
I think some fans need to realise that supporting the manager and team does not mean that you support the board.
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Agreed. Must back new manager, which does not mean you are also aligned with Board.
Just read back my last post – should have added “in all that they do”……..
Note to P67 – please add edit facility 😃
Back the manager…
Does that really mean, don’t criticise the manager ?
Because that’s not how its worked on here for the best part of the last two years.
And I think that’s actually fair enough. Because it’s part and parcel of being a Celtic manager and a Celtic player.
Everyone in attendance on Thursday and Sunday will be roaring us on to success despite some of the rather pathetic accusations of some fans wanting to see failure. So Wilfried will be backed. He’ll also be praised and criticised when merited. That’s the job.
Paul The Spark on 10th December 2025 7:57 am
I agree.
” An Dún on 10th December 2025 9:23 am
Back the manager…
Does that really mean, don’t criticise the manager ?”
Certainly not after one game !!!
Cheerio for now.
HOT SMOKED on 10TH DECEMBER 2025 10:12 AM
Right. So if he had moved Kasper to the wing back position, you wouldn’t have criticised the move ? He literally could have made any call and it can not, must not be questioned?
I’m being somewhat flippant, I admit that, but I find it ridiculous to suggest football fans must refrain from offering their opinion on their team. One game or one hundred, you’re under the spotlight at Celtic.
Good morning CQN.
Or .. perhaps not.
I thought this comment from PLB @ 12:14pm yesterday was smart and insightful.
————-
“More than that, he (Nancy) is seen by many as a barometer of the Board’s competence, so he won’t be given the benefit of the doubt he deserves. A few poor results and he’ll become a whipping boy in lieu of the Board”
————-
Reading subsequent comments across yesterday and this morning ….
It appears to me (yes, just me, could be wrong)
.. there are a constituency of Celtic fans whose relationship with the club and team they undoubtedly care deeply about
… is now executed totally and completely
… through a prism of universal and interminable hatred of the board.
Whether they are right or wrong is one thing (often discussed)
But, I think it must be really tough on those individuals. Genuinely.
And, respectfully, I don’t see how it is possible to seal and contain that hatred while, simultaneously, wholeheartedly backing the team and the manager.
One inevitably spills across into the other.
This situation doesn’t end with one side annihilating (literally) the other.
Healing desperately required.
There is a growing sickness at the heart of Celtic, a rot that starts not on the pitch, but in the boardroom.
The playbook is tired and transparent, a dash to the media with polished half-truths, an attempt to control the story before it can even be told. But the support is no longer a passive audience; they are a generation fluent in decoding spin, and they recognize a narrative being manufactured to protect power, not the club.
True custodians are defined by the clarity of their vision, not by their proximity to power. That vision must be Europe, and the relentless pursuit of relevance there. It cannot be the small, parochial game of merely besting the other half of the Old Firm. This is about ambition, not attrition.
And yet, the club remains spanceled by its own hand-wringers—those who wait, palms upturned, for crumbs from a table where they are neither welcomed nor wanted. They mistake their place in the shadow for a seat at the feast, mocked behind their backs for the grubby work, their only reward being to watch the very beast they hobble struggle on the European stage.
Attrition is a game we know. A weary, ancient song. But to build a future, you must stop fighting the old wars. The supporters who dream of European heights will not be placated by this spectacle of servitude. We demand a new blueprint, built on truth and towering ambition, not on the timid hope for scraps from a master’s table.
BACK TO BASICS – GLASS HALF FULL
And, respectfully, I don’t see how it is possible to seal and contain that hatred while, simultaneously, wholeheartedly backing the team and the manager.
—
Respectfully, I think that’s bollocks. But tell me this, do you think that some fans hatred of BR prevent led them from supporting the team wholeheartedly for the last couple of years ?
https://youtu.be/j05iJFE8F5g
LoL – as if by magic.
For the removal of doubt, I accept as fact that P67, Burnley and Celtic40me, guys like this, have wholeheartedly supported the team throughout every minute of the last two years.
To suggest otherwise is repugnant.
Every Celtic supporter wants Wilfried to thrive. Every single one.
An Dun @ 11:10 am
Respectfully, I think that’s bollocks. But tell me this, do you think that some fans hatred of BR prevent led them from supporting the team wholeheartedly for the last couple of years ?
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An D – fair enough question.
In reply …
Similar phenomenon for sure.
Two points …
The constituency you describe? I believe were tiny in number.
And they barely raised a murmur when we were winning (why would they)
One group is a squad, the other a battalion.
Second, Brendan is gone. No longer part of any problem or any solution.
The board are still here …
.. and they ain’t going anywhere
Ceausescu thought the same.
new article posted.