I’ve been looking for signs for an inflationary bounce in English football. The next Premier League TV deal is still 12 months away but at this stage before previous TV deals kicked in, clubs started spending ahead of themselves as they looked to secure a piece of the lucrative new deal. In particular, I’m keen to see how central defenders are valued.
Today news broke that West Brom agreed a deal with newly-relegated Hull City to sign central defender, James Chester (26) for £8m. Chester has 11 months left on his contract at Hull. Three years in the English Championship and 45 Premier League games over two seasons was enough evidence to induce modest West Brom to pay the asking price.
It would have helped that three other Premier League clubs, Southampton, Aston Villa and Newcastle, were also reportedly interested, but no one is making false claims for a lad who has not troubled the scouts of England’s top clubs. He’s a modest player who is able to sign a pre-contract in January. This is a spectacular fee, passing between two modest clubs, for a central defender.
Consequences for us? We’ll see.
I’m doing a State of the Club article for Friday, as we do the day before the league campaign starts. So far there’s a flow to the words. A solid result on Wednesday will reaffirm that, whereas a reversal would, frankly, deem a satisfactory assessment inappropriate.
So much turns on these next few games, Champions League qualification, squillions of pounds, and sure, the State of the Club. We’ve come through a few iterations of acceptable levels of performance over the last 20 years, since winning our first trophy in six years. Younger readers will never appreciate how precious a 1-0 Scottish Cup win over Airdrie could be.
These days it’s all about the treble and Champions League group stage qualification. The loss of a cup would be an annoyance, but Celtic need to be part of the Champions League.
Our friends at Magners have offered a pair of Premium seat tickets for the Jock Stein Stand at the opening league game of the season on Saturday. To enter, all you need to do is email me with the name [IN THE SUBJECT LINE] of who we play that day, celticquicknews@gmail.com
If you’d like to donate £1 to the CQN Mary’s Meals school kitchen appeal, help towards what would be our fifth kitchen in Malawi, you can do so here:
Entries close at 6pm this evening, so not much time.
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The star of the cup final against Airdrie was Peter Grant,played with a very bad ankled injury,and stopped a very good goal chance,with a great tackle inside the box.
gary67
12:28 on 28 July, 2015
Aberdeen now allegedly interested in the new Iniesta
SPFL Transfer News @SPFLTransfer · 4 hrs4 hours ago
#AberdeenFC match #Rangers bid for Allen.
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I’ve hardly seen the boy play, so don’t know how good he is. That would be an entertaining development if Aberdeen were to bid for him. Surely Hibs would be more willing to sell to them. That would no doubt cement the relationship between Aberdeen and the deadboys.
I still hope and believe that Liam Henderson will be our best midfielder in a couple of years.
Anybody know what budget our forthcoming opponents have each year? Surely we generate more. Failure would be unacceptable.
In Aberdeen. Grim. Very grim.
RT has been very good today.
Telling things like they really are, totally devoid of all the propaganda that the BBC, Sky, Fox and the like pour into our homes on a daily basis.
HH
Posted earlier regarding Kilmarnock away tickets, have managed to secure 3 through season books but need another one, four of us going (just need a client code, someone that is not going). My email is kevcbhoy88@yahoo.co.uk if anyone can help, cheers
.
Sandman
14:01 on
28 July, 2015
Heads-up for Bhoys who like a match flutter – paddypower currently offering 22/1 on Jo Hansen to get a brace or more.
Everywhere else he’s single figures.
..
If Celtic get a Brace tomorrow l will be Over the Moon..
001
ET,
RT can be decent but it can also be awful. The beautiful presenters make up for the spin though. Irina is a personal favourite.
The £1.50 charge is applied to all tickets bought on line,it is supposed to cover costs for postage of tickets,if it,s only to activate the card then,don,t know how it,s justified,as people on home cup scheme are not charged,either for post or for activation
Richard Hughes GRRRRR!!!
TBM
up_over_goal
13:06 on
28 July, 2015
After his wardrobe injury, I’m hoping Commons plays and scores so someone* can say it was ‘literally straight out of the top drawer’.
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You should be wearing armoir posting a comment like that :-)
Galway Races
Good word for Hearbreak City in the last race
Slabhoy – Duntocher is Green and White
14:23 on 28 July, 2015
up_over_goal
13:06 on
28 July, 2015
After his wardrobe injury, I’m hoping Commons plays and scores so someone* can say it was ‘literally straight out of the top drawer’.
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You should be wearing armoir posting a comment like that :-)
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We’re going to have to shelf these furniture puns, or it’ll get fouton ridiculous.
Paul67 et al
Another example would be current flavour of the month EPL defender John Stones. Came from Barnsley, I think, early 2013 and has played 45-50 league games since then. Depending on how you read it Everton either paid a fee of £3 million, or will do if Stones is sold. Chelsea have thus far bid £21 million, and possibly £26 million for a 21 year old. Now that is what I call inflation. If Martinez is forced to sell him, he would most likely bid less than half of that for Virgil. Is Stones a better prospect, well for the Chelsea bench he is.
The £1.50 booking fee is ridiculous – i visited the ticket office last week and took up about 5 minutes of staff time to process my visa payment and they also issued me with 3 ticket stubs which are only receipts for the 1 ticket, they advised me that my season ticket will be activated for the match – no fee involved
Yet if i did it on line – automated – £1.50
Sandman
14:28 on 28 July, 2015
Slabhoy – Duntocher is Green and White
14:23 on 28 July, 2015
up_over_goal
13:06 on
28 July, 2015
After his wardrobe injury, I’m hoping Commons plays and scores so someone* can say it was ‘literally straight out of the top drawer’.
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You should be wearing armoir posting a comment like that :-)
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We’re going to have to shelf these furniture puns, or it’ll get fouton ridiculous.
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Brilliant (“couch”ed in the vernacular too)
PS Are you a poufee?
CB
It’s been very straight today re the Libyan reporting and Saif getting sentenced to death.
They have been showing clips from 2011, and they told what would happen then, unlike the crap from western media, as yer man Saif said himself, they only want a slice of the cake.
And the self same thing is happening today in Syria, it’s all about the money.
HH
Will it not be Ticketmaster who pocket the fees as they are facilitating the process?
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Captain Beefheart
14:14 on
28 July, 2015
Anybody know what budget our forthcoming opponents have each year? Surely we generate more. Failure would be unacceptable.
..
Do You say that with a Catalan Accent a Couple of Years Back..?
..;-)
001
CB
There are many that turn the head :-)
HH
Last winter we released Caesar & The Assassin – Managing Celtic after Jock Stein which covered the period from 1978 to 1991 and featured Billy McNeill’s stints as Celtic manager with Davie Hay’s time as Celtic boss sandwiched in between.
The follow up book is called The Winds of Change – Managing Celtic FC 1991 -2004 and features the experiences of 8 managers from Brady through to MON. The sub-title for the book is We Stood with Pride.
There is a little bunnet sitting on top of the letter N in ‘Change’ in the title.
That Airdrie game is covered and so much else in a remarkable period of lows then highs for the club and the supporters.
Evening Times billboards…….
Gera boss happy with his rebuild
PanBreid csc
Daily retard on the newsnow link saying we had 37k for the game against the Icelandic team pretty sure I read it was 47k
I’ll never forget the team bus on the Gallowgate getting stopped outside every pub after the airdrie game
Paul 67
In the post rangers SPFL you have never posted a truer sentence than the one in todays blog leader.
“The loss of a cup would be an annoyance, but Celtic need to be part of the Champions League.”
The CL is the only game in town, and nowadays it is our “raison d etre”
Without it Celtic can comfortably downsize much much much further until we are back at the stage where we have average crowds of 18,000 fans at home games and where European ambition is back to where it was pre Martin O Neill days.
Quite simply in the current set up the CL group stages
it is the be all and end all and even domestic trebles in a rangerless league will not satisfy the ambitions of the Celtic support.
It is the money ball that will provide a cushion for many many years between Celtic and any Sevco revival.
Failure to acknowledge this could be a terrible mistake.
Celtic fans banned from Iraq after ‘pee stop’ plot epic bus journey from Qatar to Baku to see heroes in Euro action……..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
hhmmmm… the whole country is a toilet!!
Tomi Lahren as serious political commentary?! what is this world coming to?! she’s just a younger, and much, much, much dumber version of ann coulter (and that is saying something!)…!
for a slightly more rational analysis of America’s dealing with ISIS, Chomsky did an interview recently with Democracy Watch …
http://www.democracynow.org/2015/3/2/noam_chomsky_on_how_the_iraq
What Club is Liam being loaned to..?
From Celtic TV
Celtic TV: We are still negotiating rights for Wednesday’s match. Our aim is to be able to show live video outside the UK & Ireland. It may be Tuesday before we can confirm. Thanks
So it is Tuesday afternoon and no news.
Updates when they happen.
Keep tuned to CQN.
Slabhoy – Duntocher is Green and White
14:32 on 28 July, 2015
Brilliant (“couch”ed in the vernacular too)
PS Are you a poufee?
===========================
No, I’m a tallbhoy, but I’ve suspicions you may be a cross-dresser…
Paul highlights the £8 million centre-half – he is a EPL player.
You can’t buck the market, or, the economic law of supply and demand.
You can bet your life that the bid for VVD, if it comes, will be well south of £8 million – VVD is not a EPL player, or, an international.
He is worth £10 million only to us,
Jungle VIP
All I can say for certain is that I was charged £1:50 handling fees for a £10 ticket. 15 bloody % !
Masty
At the time, I guessed at nearer 50K than 40K . The official attendance was 48k +
MiT
I had never previously heard of Tomi Lahren but experience has taught me that simplistic, emotional responses to any complex issue are seldom, if ever, even close to adding anything worthwhile to whatever that issue may be.
JJ
Our inflationary defender VanDijk, better inflate his sharpness, or the fat lady will be singing.
Where does the Liam Henderson loan story come from?
JJ
JJ
thought that, retard being the retard as usual.
And, worse case scenario, if bumped out of Europe, Van Dijk will be sold for between 6.5 to 8 Million… That much is assured
Some may think we should qualify for the CL every week .
I on the other hand still gawp in astonishment when we score an away goal. The 1980’s &90’s euro heartache have left their mark on this bhoy.
I always understood that the home club held the broadcasting rights to qualifying games.
If that is the case, who are Celtic TV negotiating with? Celtic FC?
thompsontwin
14:59 on 28 July, 2015
Are you hurtin’ ?…. well, don’t you worry yourself about CELTIC’s finances…… bless you