It was a long 48 hours before yesterday’s statement from chief exec, Peter Lawwell. He explicitly acknowledged “hurt, disappointment and frustration following the team’s recent results”, but the implicit backing was there for “Neil, the players and the backroom staff”.
I have been critical of Neil’s decision in recent weeks, team plans change every hour but we do not appear to know how fix the fundamental problem. What actually is wrong? is a harder question to answer than it appears. It was not playing three at the back (or four), nor was choosing one player over another. If only it was as simple as a solitary scapegoat in the team. There is bigger question: Is the problem actually the manager?
It could be. Responsibility to fix team structure certainly lies with Neil, but there are doubtlessly other things going on that few of us are aware of. Neil carries the can, but he would be gone if the board thought that was all there is to the story.
Winning the league is going to take a huge effort this month and successful recruitment next month. Having been denied the opportunity to scout players during the spring and summer, a great deal of work has gone into preparing for January. Do the club have faith in this work? Would another manager ‘put his name’ to those targets blind?
Your recruitment strategy goes out the door with the manager. My suspicion is the club weigh the need for squad additions higher than changing the manager. These are the questions that separate those who are paid the big bucks from those who write blogs. Thankfully……
Celtic: Fifty Flags Plus One, an anthology of how Celtic won each of their league titles, is available now. Starting with our first title in 1893, it details how Willie Maley brought consistent glory, then the sparse successes over four decades before Jock Stein arrived in 1965 and the more contemporary wins since.
It will rekindle memories you had forgotten and give insight into how the leagues were won.
SPECIAL OFFER, free copy of Seville, The Celtic Movement, while stocks last!
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The battered Bunnet
Indeed I was wrong , I really thought he would of been
As just a normal Celtic fan we all come in different sizes , colours , political views and values , but there does seem to be a question why he doesn’t even Hint of any sort of failure from Peter ,
which seems very strange and very Comical Ali
There does seem to be any article criticising rangers also has to have a bit of a dig at Celtic even though it is irrelevant to the inquiry.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/dec/03/rangers-football-forgotten-tragedy-ibrox-stadium-disaster-glasgow
AIPPLE on 2ND DECEMBER 2020 11:53 PM
Thanks for the article.
And for anyone that’s interested, here’s a link to a (free) book by Bob Altemeyer, a psychology professor in the states who has spent his life studying authoritarians and especially their followers. He developed the RWA test (Right Wing Authoritarian) and while the topic sounds heavy he writes in an accessible manner.
https://theauthoritarians.org/options-for-getting-the-book/
2 great posts last night responding to Paul’s speculative article why board would want to keep NL on.
CORNELIUS @ 8:34pm
&
ROBBERTTRESSEL @ 9:27pm
100% with Roberttressel post – fans would rather see a team properly organised than clamour for new signings in January.
January spending is a flawed argument given what we have seen past 4 months on the pitch. Sounds like a squirrel to deflect from lack of strategic planning at board level.
DAVID66- not been red carded mate,wasn’t on a lot yesterday, I advised the guy to take his 5 day argument/trolling to the previous article and fill his boots,he came back with the usual, he’s close to getting punted off another site,for the same nonsense, not happy unless he’s baiting someone, have a good day HH
Good morning from a wet match day here in North Staffs.
Rest broonie, Callum and Ryan
Play 5-4-1
Also, can somebody at CP tell NL and the players to do their talking on the pitch!
Getting fed up with these pressers & been told this team will click…….any year now :0
Seems to be the plan that there will be new signings in Janaury, as I said before, I wouldnt allow the scouts manager or club to spend another penny on players, show you can coach, send out a team with a plan, bringing more into what we are already doing at the moment will improve nothing.
Yorkbhoy – it is a good article but I got the same impression.
YORKBHOY on 3RD DECEMBER 2020 8:38 AM
‘There does seem to be any article criticising rangers also has to have a bit of a dig at Celtic even though it is irrelevant to the inquiry.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/dec/03/rangers-football-forgotten-tragedy-ibrox-stadium-disaster-glasgow
—-
‘The club was ordered to pay damages of just over £26,000.’……
‘ the company that now owns Rangers is different from the one that was running the club in 1971’
######
The defender that was ordered to pay damages by the court was a limited company, not a club.
And that was because there was no ‘club’, separate from the limited company.
The club was the company. The company was the club.
That company no longer exists. It was liquidated.
At least I’ll be able to watch the game tonight it’s on the BT Sports ( channel 410) at 5.30 tonight.
Some people on this site didn’t want David Moyes as manager. He is doing all right at west ham.
Jobo…..I too am looking forward to tonights game, in fact I am looking forward to tonight in general.
I am however not looking forward to 12.00am….. It’s (my third) colonoscopy time……a case I suppose of GIRUM….get it right up me!
Hope the consultant has washed his hands !
Hail Hail
Matt
12pm…
Westcraigs – Indeed. An awful lot of people sneered at Gerrard but he’s not doing badly – like it or not.
Tonight’s….his/her hands…..I may be a bit nervous.
Can’t find ma glasses….I think I know where they might be😷
Hail Hail
Matt
MATT STEWART
12am bit early for a probe …still better early than to late 😜
If I was a sevco supporter I would want the status quo at celtic. When Neil gets a vote of confidence from the opposition you know something is wrong. All the sevco men in the media don’t want change.
Remember “Greig must stay” Greig was gone shortly after.
Moderator – Thanks for your response.
It is appreciated.
Cheers
D :)
BB – I wasn’t sure if it was you or Philbhoy that had a spat with Chumpbhoy.
confusedcsc.
Philbhoy I seen that as I went on to the other site and seen he started there as well.
The guy has issues.
HH
D :)
THE BATTERED BUNNET on 3RD DECEMBER 2020 8:21 AM
Syd
Knowing Paul, he’d utterly cringe as the idea that he is or ever was “the voice of the fans”.
###
My assumption has always been that he was intended to be the voice to the fans from the the board aka Peter Lawwell.
Hence the need for a long spoon and copious amounts of salt.
Goodness me, Matt Stewart.
Up at the crack of dawn then?
Geebee 1978 said earlier on:
“Of course, I don’t have inside knowledge..”
I would be interested in the outcome If more posters considered this before making a point.
WESTCRAIGS on 3RD DECEMBER 2020 10:16 AM
Noses have been turned up on this site about quite a few managers who’d be a big step up from what we have now….
HOT SMOKED on 3RD DECEMBER 2020 10:43 AM
True. I think it’s important to clarify that it’s my personal opinion and not something that I or others should view as fact.
DAVID66
Indeed!
I should no better, but…………….
Geebee
I agree. Opinion on here is often worded as fact and, for me, it immediately lessens any impact it might otherwise have had.
Wee bit slippy for cycling so Caroline and I off for a seaside walk instead.
Cheerio for now.
Matt
I’m due to have a colonoscopy in the next 2 weeks. So good luck
At this point, almost any manager out there would be a step up.
That is not intended flippantly; what the club needs right now is fresh thinking. These players need to be liberated and allowed to play expressively again.
I think just about any new boss would get better performances out of them at the moment … the whole club feels as if it’s plodding along right now, like someone carrying the weight of the world. The board is crazy to think that will change without remedial action.
Jack Ross? I’d have said absolutely not. Nothing in his career justifies it, and as a long term appointment it wouldn’t do at all. But could he improve the team in the here and now? Absolutely.
JAMES FORREST on 3RD DECEMBER 2020 11:00 AM
Is Jack Ross an elite manager? Certainly not.
Is he better than Slippy G? I would say yes.
Wouldn’t get the pulses racing and I’m by no means putting his name out there but we’re at the stage where anything is better than nothing.
I truly wish Rod Stewart would go back to what he is good at, ie living off his fans, and to leave Celtic alone.
GEEBEE1978:
Totally agree. The change is what the whole club needs more than a big name right now.
This is why I don’t balk at the idea of a Keane-O’Neill partnership to the end of the season … and MON as director of football is an attractive proposition anyway.
One of the problems here – and you see this in industry as well, with Apple being the notable success story in opposition, as someone pointed out today to Nokia – is that we have accountants poking theiir noses into areas where they don’t belong.
The best thing that Apple has ever done is put engineers and creative thinkers in charge of product development and manufacturing … at Celtic it’s about time the football people were left in sole charge of the football. Lawwell has no qualifications or background in the game … yet he gets to impose players on the managers. It’s absolutely bonkers.
The sad thing about tonight for me is the likely damage continues.
Neil puts faith in players and systems he can’t get a tune out of.
Players unlikely to respond to his systemic failings again and we lose, hopefully not heavily but a possibility.
Celtic fans turn it up another notch in exasperation/frustration.
Board say nothing. Human shield Neil looks distraught but says all the same things in post match.
Sunday becomes a game with incredibly heightened backdrop – police presence at Celtic Park probably….fan demos, etc
So bloody avoidable if we hadn’t fallen asleep at the wheel.
HH
That Nokia line should read “as someone pointed out to me this week” – on this site as it happens.
Got to follow up on that as I said I would.
Ernie
“My assumption has always been that he was intended to be the voice to the fans from the the board aka Peter Lawwell.”
CQN predates Peter Lawwell’s appointment as CEO, although not quite his return to Celtic as Exec Director.
Saying that, I doubt there are many folk outside of Celtic that have Paul’s level of access to Lawwell.
Has anyone considered the idea of Moravcik as a Dof?
Always enjoy the chance to watch Celtic. Tonight will be no exception.
Expectations are realistic and I doubt any result really changes minds around our strategic direction.
Well, unless we hammer them I suppose!
BIG WAVY:
Wer’re actually in the unbelievable scenario – and I’m writing about this between posts on here haha – of going into this game tonight knowing it doesn’t matter at all. We could get an epochal hiding, and I expect us to, and yet an under pressure manager who’s already under massive scrutiny, effectively has nothing to fear from it.
There’s no incentive for anyone at Celtic to go above and beyond tonight. No incentive for players to turn it on. No incentive for the manager to get even the most basic calls correct because it won’t move the board one inch. It’s a risk free endevour for all concerned, except the fans.
Absolutely mind-blowing. A totally meaningless, pointless excercise of no consequence whatsoever.
To be honest, if I didn’t have to write about it I’d be tempted to ignore it completely, that’s how totally without meaning it is. The manager has been given a free pass for the night, so why should anyone else bother?