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……
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JAMES FORREST on 2ND DECEMBER 2020 12:44 PM
I’ve always thought that Paul67 has more meaningful and worthy aims than changing long-decided readers’ minds or playing to the crowd. It’s why I still read it, but maybe that’s just me.
FWIW- If the current squad was coached properly, by a new manager, we wouldn’t be far away IMO
Would also have been something not right about another Manager leading the team to a quadruple treble…
Paul67
Your post only increases my concerns about the absolute shambles that our scouting is.
Surely we are not only considering players who have played over the last 3 months.
Surely we have dossiers on players , going back years , not months .
Dermot Desmond has to change tact .
It’s a busted flush .
They are correct if they don’t think this all lyes at NFL’s door, because even more lyes at PL’s door , and beyond him DD.
They are wasting the biggest financial advantage we have ever had .
Not buying players until we know what our income from European football will be , instead of buying players to help improve our chances of CL income .
Is the biggest fault .
It is a continuation downward spiral.
The standard and ambitions of our scouting is going to ruin us .
Not so long ago you confidently told me that Rangers would not win another league in my lifetime.
I went home and had a check up to see if I was terminally ill .(:-)
The magnitude of this mess will disable the club for a decade.
Unless they solve it now.
I have very little faith that they will.
Our board and main shareholder lack ambition, desire , and reject all forms of risk.Where Celtic is concerned.
The Hun BOD’s are risking their own money .
They have more skin in the game.
They want it more.
It’s as simple as that .
TT
Ah, MORE recruitment? Because we’ve nailed it so well recently.
It’s hard to tell now if the board are stubborn, incompetent or simply indifferent.
What I do know is that they’ve let a once in a lifetime season drift by and potentially hand Sevco a treble.
!!Bada Bing!! on 2nd December 2020 12:57 pm
FWIW- If the current squad was coached properly, by a new manager, we wouldn’t be far away IMO
————–
That and Bolingoli we’d be top of the league right now.
You want to know what my problem is? You want to know what it boils down to?
You want to know why Paul67 gets more of my anger than other people?
Because this site has influence. This site has weight.
Paul’s spelled it out in no uncertain terms that he knows EXACTLY what’s gone wrong at the club this season, and that it can be summed up in two words; Neil Lennon.
I also KNOW that he cannot be ignorant as to the broken nature of our entire system of doing things. He cannot be COMPLETELY ignorant that part of the problem is the interfering nature of the untitled director of football, a man who has consisttently stuck his nose into areas where he has not the remotest qualification or skill, to the detriment of our club.
Paul Brennan is not a stupid man. So when I write that there is a cancer eating away at Celtic and that it has a name and it has a face he knows who I am talking about as well as anyone does.
Every blogger who cares about Celtic has a RESPONSIBILITY to want change. A responsibility. To squander his influence and this site’s ability to affect change in this manner … it depresses me.
For a guy like Paul to act as a shill for this failing plan and this failing board … it’s shocking.
I don’t know how he can do it and pretend it serves the good of Celtic.
Can’t say I go along with bide your time new additions coming…. Been let down sooo many times on that front….. Also problem being.. Things could be all gone by jan 1st
Who was approached to be Neil’s replacement but said no because he wouldn’t ‘put his name’ to those transfer targets blind?
Mibbe PAUL67 likes Neil Lennon and all the members of the board.
Mibbe he loves them.
If so why publicly flog them?
To suit the agenda of another blogger whose site is dying on it’s arse?
To suit posters who have a different view?
It’s PAUL’s blog and he chooses his subjects to write about. I’m ok with that although I often disagree with what he writes.
James Forrest in spite of what he says would love PAUL to say the equivalent of “fuck this” and shut down in the hope we all end up reading his anti board/celtic diatribes.
Not for me mate.
And If I invited you into my house and you spoke to me the way you address PAUL you’d get kicked out for good.
You are an ignoramus with an agenda and anger issues.
Read what you post before you get help.
What actually is wrong?’ All wrong roads lead to Lawwell
Since 1991 we have had 14 managers.
With the exception of MON and Tommy Burns we have castigated every single one of them in some shape or form.
Hmmmmmmmmmm
Greenpinata,
Getting the best out of players is a coach’s job and for a group regressing under Neil, it’s clear they don’t feel valued in that way. Neil’s system, selections and tactics seems to be diminishing them weekly:
Duffy as a ballplaying CH ?
Christie as a RW and shoot from anywhere ?
Ajeti, Klimala and Eddie all playing up front alone?
Ntcham, McGregor and Brown all bumping into each other in midfield?
Moi never a LWB?
CHs exposed by an aging DM and 2 wingers at eitehr side?
No consistent GK but last year’s 3rd choice now? or not ?
James playing injured?
Dembele gone from the scene?
Everyone pissed at the leniency over Griff and the hard line over Bolingoli?
Hail Mary subs in the last 5 minutes to try and win a game?
etc etc
This has developed now to a point where it has impacted everyone it seems, even Scott Brown, the last connection with Neil.
Players will bounce back under a new coach if they feel valued, listened to and are developing their career.
HH
Recruiting players isn’t a problem . We’ve got hunners of them . Mostly non-playing players , unfortunately.
As things are – it’s much more likely that when we get to January, the league will all but be over.
Any transfer funds will be kept until a new permanent manager is in place to aid the summer rebuild.
Pinning our hopes on the January transfer window while keeping Lennon in place is clearly nonsense.
Indeed, it’s so self evidently nonsense that I find myself asking the question, have our board already given up this season ?
JAMES FORREST
You want to know why Paul67 gets more of my anger than other people?
___________________________________________
Naw!
You really need to get your anger issues addressed.
Seriously.
“Your recruitment strategy goes out the door with the manager. ”
Only if the manager has absolutely no say in recruitment. Whoever recruited Shved, Bayo, Barkas, Turnbull, Taylor, Boli, Soro, Klimala (feel free to add) should’ve been out of the door long before January.
PHILBHOYl
First, I’ll be here – and so will the site – for a long time to come, so don’t get your hopes up.
Secondly, what’s my agenda? And spare me the “promoting the blog” pish … if you think that’s why I post on here you’re stupider than you’ve made yourself sound.
Thirdly, don’t second guess me, little man, it’s clear that my objectives are far beyond your comprehension. You have no idea how long I’ve known Paul or what our relationship was like and still kind of is like. I know more than you do on many, many fronts and one of the things I know is that I’ve said some of this stuff to Paul’s face on different occasions in the past where he’s defended our CEO.
Finally, read what YOU post before you get help.
I’m sure you know what that actually means, as you wrote it.
To me it’s English translated into Frecnh into Polish into English into Swahili and then back to English again. But I could be wrong.
Oh man, the deluded leading the deluded today.
“”I am very grateful (for the backing). They are not a board that sack managers for the sake of it.”
Haha. For the sake of it.
Not for the sake of a Champions League, two scandalous defeats at the hands of Prague, not the sake of a gutless surrender to the Ibrox mob without getting a shot on goal or the League Cup exit at home to Ross County. For the sake of the ephemeral “it.”
This is the guy they are backing to get us out of this hole, the guy our host wants to have more money to spend in January. Is Neil Lennon the problem?
Lol.
Aaah man. I guess moving the furniture at Lennoxtown didn’t work.
If “working on corners” doesn’t help us tomorrow I wonder what the next masterplan will look like?
JAMES FORREST
Your insults are water off a ducks back.
You have issues.
I’m worried about you.
PHILBHOY:
And you, little man, should worry about yourself.
You have no issues, I assume.
Well, apart from the obvious one …
Frecnh?
You obviously don’t read your posts.
HoHoHo
Oh god…really trying to scroll on but, but its difficult.
Im oot!
I’ve learned a huge amount about the inner workings of Celtic over the last couple of weeks. Deeply unimpressed.
Sad when the people you thought were ‘operators’ turn out to be just like you and me !
All this tadger-waving, ‘bet I can pish higher than you’ stuff is excruciating, whoever’s keyboard it comes from.
Sometimes laughable in a perverse way, but heavily immature.
Somebody asked if anybody thinks Lenny’s not the actual problem: he might not be suggests some research.
I posted this item a day back which shows that luck – rather than skill – defines any manager’s tenure.
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/sacking-managers-pointless-stats-slaven-bilic-west-ham-premier-league-a8044586.html
I reckon we’re where we are due to a mix of petulant wantaways, profligate Operations, psychological frailty and uninspired coaching. Some cocktail heading for a still doable 10 eh!!
PHILBHOY:
Listen, do yourself a favour and move on.
Better than that, do your fellow CQN posters a favour and move on, because between blogs I can keep this up all day, dissecting you piece by piece. But it’s not fun for me. It’s like hunting a fox with a machine gun, if there was any satisfaction to be gained from it I might feel differently, but it’s not even target practice.
The rest of these guys don’t want to read it, they aren’t interested in it.
But if you keep it up I’ll keep slapping you all day an all night. Because I can. Because I am quite mad. Because of my “Issues”. Because of … because of … because of …
Jmes Forrest,
thanks very much for the insult,
can i ask do you still carry CQN content on your own site?
MR ANGRY
Your insults are water off a ducks back.
And for the avoidance of doubt I am 6′ 2″ in my stocking soles.
Are you never on your own blog or do you spend all day on here being angry?
Oh dear, sad but predictable, I suppose the only thing missing from the recent blogs by our board is the attack on the FM, maybe we’ll get that tomorrow.
So the “strategy” is to have a great January window in the middle of a pandemic whilst continuing to pay the wages of a squad full of uncommitted wasters? Really that’s it? Because our recent scouting has been so successful?
Santa Clause and the tooth fairy all rolled into one.
MR ANGRY
Violence now, machine guns and slapping me down.
You do need help!
GORDYBHOY64:
My own site? We don’t have a section for content from other blogs? I don’t quite know what you’re asking.
But I’ll say this; ony the Facebook Group and Page for the blog I carry all the Celtic sites. All of them. I promote them all. Whether I agree with them or not. Some of the guys who run those sites I actually don’t get on with on a personal level, but I promote them anyway because that’s how it’s meant to work.
We’re a Family. We’re a Community. We might disagree and we might do it very forcefully and vocally at times, but we are all on the same side.
And so I would NEVER fail to promote the work a Celtic site does … all but one, and I won’t even mention which one it is. The issues there are waaay beyond personal animosity; I won’t promote a racist, a bigot, a mysoginist, a homophobe.
Maybe we can sign players in January like Turnbull, Soro, Klimala and not play them. Reminds me of a poster think it might have been Neganon who always said we are promised jam tomorrow.
Currently on a work call with very senior leaders, focused on corporate governance. The point made by the chair:
“If you have a high performing CEO you can probably get away with weak corporate governance. However, if you have a poorly performing CEO aligned to weak corporate governance you run the risk of crashing the whole organisation”.
From a highly respected industry leader in the field of governance.
PHILBHOY:
You’re 6’2? Big deal! What the Hell does that even mean little man?
You clearly have a problem with reading … so let me re-post. I can do a recording and read it back to you if that helps?
“…. because between blogs I can keep this up all day …”
BETWEEN blogs. I’m on a coffee break. That’s what you are to me, five minutes of my spare time. Don’t go overblowing your own importance wee guy.
QUADROPHENIAN on 2ND DECEMBER 2020 1:17 PM
Interesting article Quad, thanks for posting, missed it first time around. Another perspective that’s possibly worth considering, although part of me is left wondering if that article was co-written with collaboration from the managers union…:)
HH
PETERLATCHFORDSBELLY:
Very valid point mate. It’s like that thing posted yesterday on the failure of Nokia.
Organisations are only as good as their leaders.
What an education we’ve had this week into ours.
MR ANGRY
We’re a Family. We’re a Community. We might disagree and we might do it very forcefully and vocally at times, but we are all on the same side.
””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””
Until one of us questions your motives and you insult and threaten with violence.
Whose writing the pish now?
Greenpinata on 2nd December 2020 1:03 pm
I disagree, the only manager who really united the support into pushing for a sacking was Tony Mowbray.
I would hate to think that we continue with Neil and end up at that point with him in 3 or 4 weeks time, he does not deserve it.
However if it turns out most of us are wrong and he turns this around I’ll be the biggest, happiest consumer of humble pie south of the river.