18 months, 19 substitute appearances and 20 starts after leaving Celtic, Jota is back! He first joined Celtic as a 22-year-old in 2021, part of a revolutionary intake that summer, which saw Ange Postecoglou, Cameron Carter-Vickers and Kyogo, who passed Jota in the revolving door yesterday and became an instant success.
A five-and-a-half year contract for a player who turns 26 in March means the player should spend his best years at Celtic.
The €10m fee paid is approximately £17m less than the club received for him when he departed for Al Ittihad in Saudi, although that’s not all profit. Benfica received a significant slice of that fee, and we paid £6m for him initially. So we have paid approx. £14m (£6m and €10m/£8m), received £25m and Benfica earned just north of £6m kickback when he left Glasgow in 2023.
Benfica are £12m up for nurturing Jota, Celtic are up around £5m, despite having to sign him twice. The whole episode is full of lessons.
The first is for wingers. Why did such a talent fail to make the cut in Saudi and France? This goes back to a lesson we first learned with Patrick Roberts, also a prodigious winger. Players like Jota, Patrick and (I suggest) Nicolas Kuhn thrive in dominant teams. They have the craft to open up tight defences. This contrasts with the more athletic type of winger, commonly found in sides who dominate their leagues less than Celtic.
Look at the physicality of the wingers we face on Wednesday, or any winger outside the elite teams in England. They are generally taller and always strong. More like Daizen Maeda and James Forrest than Nicolas or Jota. Daizen would be first name on the team sheet for a side struggling in the French league. They need someone with the engine to get up and down the field all game. By contrast, a winger who can unlock a packed defence is superfluous to requirements.
There are also lessons for our player development strategy. I used to flinch when I read one of our teenage talents heading to Bayern Munich or Liverpool, less so Watford. Players who make it through the youth ranks at Celtic are already elite in some respects. A few are offered contracts for the first team and so many knock it back to try their chances elsewhere.
If it’s Jurgen Klopp or a Bayern Munich coach, can you blame them? Yes, of course, you can, but we need to learn to not worry about it. There is nothing we can do if the likes of Klopp gets in the room with a young Celtic player.
What if they are offered three times what Celtic assess is the going rate for their talents at Watford? We need to learn not to sweat this. The major work in player development is seldom their innate talent, it is more commonly their developmental path.
There is absolutely a lesson for Celtic from watching what Benfica do. A club who can afford to discard a talent like Jota, who was well down the Class of 2018 list, have different options from us.
Finally, we need to examine how we (and specifically who) identified Jota. That process also delivered Nicolas Kuhn and must be nurtured. I have my worries on that front.
Going forward, the job of Celtic centre forward is about to be come the easiest in the game. With defenders doubling up on Kuhn and Jota, there will be so much space through the middle, we might be able to bring back Albian Ajeti and still score goals!
Welcome home, Jota!
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French refereeing team, Clement Turpin is the ref, we have had him before, not a ref who wants to be the story gives decisions by pointing where the foul happened and gets on with it, Man City have Spanish officials.
Expect a busy revolving door after Wednesday and Brendan to get his new striker by 3rd Feb, Kieran Tierney might be held by Arsenal till summer.
Three wins, three draws, and one defeat will please Dermot Desmond and justify his inspired reappointment of Brendan Rodgers.
First trophy of the season secured, treble, vast improvement in Europe and a manager busy building a playing staff, with Celtic supporters money.
Happy Days CSC
IL PADRINO @ 1:47 PM,
Well, to put it in context BURNLEY78, mentioned Leicester City in his response, so I was looking at it more of a “resume” type context.
Gordon Strachan’s away record in Europe was far more abysmal that Brendan Rodgers.
There is also this idea that GS couldn’t recruit good players, is a nonsense, the idea that Celtic could sign a Dutch International Striker, or a specialist like Nakamura now a day’s is nonsensical.
Players like those and Boruc were brought in at their peak and were allowed to stay at Celtic and run down their contract.
We are not comparing like for like,
Lenny’s record in the UCL was mixed to say the least.
The consistency we are now showing is paramount to our progress.
Hail Hail
treble on *
I would like Celtic to give their best defensively and also when we can attack, not play 1 particular style however having a big striker on from the start might mean we play more long balls, if they’re accurate it’s not an issue, Tielemans is class for them and they have nippy physical attackers, Martinez is an annoyance unless playing against England.
GLASSTWOTHIRDSFULL on 28TH JANUARY 2025 2:01 PM
You have to take advantage of your luck though.
OPTAs power ranking had our fixures as being the easiest of all 32 teams when they were drawn this season.
After 7 fixures I dont know how its panned out but a quick look the teams immedaitely above and below us in the coefficient table suggest we did get lucky.
Another winger will mean,bracing ourselves for bids for Kuhn in summer
Anyone who seriously thought we spent like a top 20 rich team back in WGS era needs to look at our financials.
It is ridiculous to suggest we came close to a top 50 team in expenditure back then.
WGS beat a top Man U and Milan team in their prime and others. We have yet to beat a real top team this season. 5th in Germany is as good as it gets.
Even Lenny beat a top Spanish team in 12/3 which again betters anything BR has done.
The same BR who lost to Athens amongst others.
https://theanalyst.com/2024/08/champions-league-2024-25-fixture-difficulty-group-stage
BigChipsUK on 28th January 2025 1:56 pm
“That BBC link gives you the live table (with slight delays as you say), but it doesn’t give a current view of the play-off draw based upon those standings.”
Ah, I get what you mean now. That would be good; bound to be a twitter feed somewhere with that. That’s the kind of thing my eldest will be thinking of and keeping me updated on (for Celtic at least and likely Liverpool and Barca too). Even with the pressure off I won’t be able to think beyond our playoff opponent. I think, even with this years draw, that we are still due a bit of luck especially when I think back to AC Milan away in the last 16 I think it was before Kaka did for us again when we could/should have had a pen.
QB
I’m not too bothered about the result tomorrow night, the result that gives us the easier play off draw is the result I want, if that means losing, then ok.
This is where we want to be, we’ve made three times what the Huns have made in the europa and that gulf looks set to increase.
Brendan has taken us to new levels in this competition, hopefully we draw an opponent we can have a real go at in the play offs.
Sondre Ørjasæter 1.80 Metres
Celtic40me
I think you will find the basic evidenced facts will
Not defeat Trump style restating untruths.
You will also find that since the draw our opponents in all cases except Slovan and Atalanta have performed far worse this season domestically than projected and far worse in the CL with the exception of Brugge and Atalanta.
An Dun
Losing will certainly lead to to an away second leg. Personally I always feel a second leg at home is a huge advantage now that the away goals rule is scrapped.
Otherwise I would be inclined to agree with you were it not for the coeff points and £2m at stake.
BURNLEY78 @ 2:14 PM,
Neil Lennon, Club legend that he is, is a very limited football manager.
He took Brendan Rodgers, invincible, treble winning side and left Ange with a basket case of a squad.
Hail Hail
https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=UAdhGbSq&id=EF940EAB62EC8B89B5EF5B979B446125DD1CD4A5&thid=OIP.UAdhGbSqja4i3iGovS5MTgHaEK&mediaurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwindows10spotlight.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2019%2F07%2F50076119b4aa8dae22de21a8bd2e4c4e.jpg&cdnurl=https%3A%2F%2Fth.bing.com%2Fth%2Fid%2FR.50076119b4aa8dae22de21a8bd2e4c4e%3Frik%3DpdQc3SVhRJuXWw%26pid%3DImgRaw%26r%3D0&exph=1080&expw=1920&q=Palombagia&simid=608022101443307016&FORM=IRPRST&ck=160E7ED04DEA091DDA7B569EF0662B4C&selectedIndex=12&itb=0&cw=1397&ch=703&ajaxhist=0&ajaxserp=0
!!Bada Bing!! on 28th January 2025 1:37 pm
https://x.com/AnthonyRJoseph/status/1884233261330903502?t=PQZpUmSwjgHqrLUljg7xUw&s=19
Winger bid
Bada, I can imagine the nickname he would get if he had a couple of great games agin the Hun.
Ave Ave
Good afternoon all from the Brazen Head. Another great day in old Glasgow Town.
Where’s wur new striker?🤔😁
BURNLEY78 @ 2:14 PM,
Gordon Strachan signed Scott Brown for a Scottish record fee.
Brendan Rodgers ten years later couldn’t sign John McGinn for pro-rata half that amount.
Hail Hail
Does anyone know the opta stats Aalborg, Artmedia Bratislava, Utrecht, FC Sion, Maribor, Legia Warsaw, Cluj or Ferencvaros ?
BIGRAILROADBLUES
Victoria Bar 👍
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zkJ8h0z2jg
Malmo !
I knew I was forgetting another horror show in that list.
Burnley78 on 28th January 2025 8:19 am
An T
We all know what Gary Keown is about but I ask you a straightforward question what there anything factually incorrect in the article which was shared on here yesterday ?
Our manger inherited a successful treble winning team and has had the money to build on it. He has just enjoyed the easiest possible draw in the league stage in Europe and reached the play offs for last 16. Our rivals domestically have been in meltdown financially and structurally during his tenure. They are now showing green shoots that they may be improving and they pushed us all the way in a league cup final recently. They have at last accepted need for a pragmatic signing policy and trading model. We appear to be going in the opposite direction.
Burnley78
If we all know what Gary Keown is B79?
Why are you stealing his crayons,adopting his malicious tone and believing the hurtiest of nonsense spouted by him?
Your words from above👆
“Treble squad and money to build”
“easiest possible draw”
“reaching last 16 of CL”
“Our rivals self harm addiction”
“Celtic league cup victory means they are improving”
“the adoption of a pragmatic signing policy and trading model
Gene 9.12am- more NECESSITY than pragmatism on adopting a new trading model
Darwin- 9.14 malicius misrepresentation of facts on article with Celtics response since.
Chairboy- what happened to the generation of domination
WeeBobbyCollins 9.51-“Your constant whinging about negative supporters, followed by your continuous veiled criticism of our manager makes you come across as a wee bit hypocritical…
B78 i am going to go thro the article and set out what is factually incorrect later- ps line1 we did not technically qualify for anything we did so factually!!
But before i do please explain your lack of confidence in Celtic that prompts you to imply that article is factually correct??
What is at the heart of this lack/loss of confidence? ie its origins?
You dont have belief in our board? You have no belief in BR&players? You have no belief in the fans?
What is it B78,the above trinity are Celtic?
I wonder where your nervousness comes from
I dont get it,lay it out where you are in doubt?
Ps i get p67s dislike for BR,its his blog seen as a puppet on outside,alas as youll know by now his days of itk are gone sadly but it is still a great forum to dissent,and at your level(board) yours is way of the mark.
Hope your well.
Hail Hail
Easy to find bad Euro results for Celtic managers,
Artemedia 5 Wee Gordon Strachan 0
Talking of successful champions league campaign and top managers our last encounter with Unai Emery was in season 2012/2013 when we beat Spartak Moscow home and away. Ten points that season, three wins, a draw and two defeats by a goal including an injury time defeat in Barcelona. Probably up there with our best performance in the CL and all without John McGinn or any money spent on the team.
Emery was yet to win any of his four Europa Leagues but he had reached the semi final the season before. He did win it the next season.
QuadBhoy on 28th January 2025 2:14 pm
BigChipsUK on 28th January 2025 1:56 pm
I highly recommend the UEFA own website for the inplay live league updates and play off positions.
You can watch celtic (and all the others) slide up and down the table as the goals go in, really fascinating for the stattos.
The bottom line, and I bet UEFA cannot belive how succesful it all is, everybody has something to play for with I think only Liverpool gauranteed the top spot.
Try the simulator as well.
The bizarre thing, as others have said, we could be playing man city or real having finished in the table higher than them.
We could also see Benfica cloose up as potential opponents.
https://www.uefa.com/uefachampionsleague/standings/
try the simulator, put in the results and click on bracket view to see how the play off positions change
https://www.uefa.com/uefachampionsleague/simulator/
Complicated, but a brilliant piece of work from someone at ETims.
Info graphic of play off standings if we beat, drw or lose to Villa.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GiQATZ7XkAA_CEz?format=png&name=4096×4096
Tony Mowbray and his Wembley Wizards 👍
oh, and what we need from all the other fixtures to go our way.
bizarelly, going by names and not current form, we could get beat and end up with a favourable play off with lille or brest.
or we could win, and play real, benfica, psg, munich.
incredible format.
my one nagging doubt is the big boys will play for the result that suits their next round ambitions.
oh, and liverpool can still be taken over by barca, so everyone does indeeed have something to play for.
roll on tomorrow.
BOURNESOUPRECIPE
You are in the Victoria Bar?
You can’t be any worse than ajeti. 🤣
Villa with one fit centre half, looking like Lucas Digne will play there.
Their fans are criticisng the club for selling Diego Carlos before they signed a replacement but Emery explained: “We wanted to replace him at the same time but couldn’t. We have to accept it. I believe in the squad we have.”
Valle to Como. Leaves only 1 LB Taylor for the Villa match.
Scales can do LB
It means they’ll probably play Ian Maatsen at left back, who cost them £40m in the Summer and was in the champions league team of the season after losing in the final.
Scales is too slow on the turn to play full back