Shakhtar Karagandy Russian manager, Viktor Kumykov, gave an interview after their elimination of the Albanian champions in the last Champions League qualifier. He talked about his team, which, unlike some in former Soviet countries, does not have an oligarch benefactor or rich sponsor.
Kumykov thought four of his potential opponents were of equal standing, although he clearly respects Celtic’s recent achievements in the Champions League.
He said, “Getting through to the play offs round is historical achievement for the club and for Kazakh football. We hope this is for the start and we would play in Europe regularly. Even if we don’t go to the Champions League, we will play in UEFA Europa League, which means we will be in the elite of the European football.
“We have made it to the group stage of one of the European competitions, which was our main target. It does not mean we can rest now and say we will not fight for more, but our main target is Cup of Kazakhstan. We have never won it before.
“From a football perspective, I think it might be better for us to be in the Europa League than the Champions League. If we go through to the Champions League we will play against much better teams, where we can meet giant clubs. For this we would need to buy few players to strengthen the team. We short of depth and players I have at the moment would not cope with big competitions. I have no experienced players.
“It’s difficult to say who against I want to play. All five teams are better than us. Celtic is different story, they are apart from the others. That team played in the Champions League last season and got through to the knock out round. They beat Barcelona. They beat Spartak Moscow away and at home.
“The Other four are all similar class one to each other but they are all stronger than us. Each of them play at a higher level. The team God gives us will be the team we will play against. It makes no sense to say who we want.”
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Off to Atha Cliath to watch the Hoops v some pub team…
Robbie Keane spotted at Ross Hall….
Good Morning Timland.
What’s this I’m hearing, a hack telling it
how it is………it will never catch on….bet
he disnae show his face at ibrokes the
day……God help him if he does.
truthatlastCSC.
Ah.Lovely.
Setanta Oz.
Huns tonight
Mini huns tomorrow night.
RT re your use of initials I usually do but as Valentine’s day just posted before me I shall refrain..
BT
Can someone post the Glenn Gibbons article …please and thanks
HH
I take it back it is artificial “grass”
“Even the plastic pitch in Astana is the best and the newest. The artificial 3G surface in the space-age stadium is so modern in fact that the Kazakh FA insist they will not be watering it before kick-off. It looked flat in every sense of the word when Ireland trained on it in the freezing cold dark”
GLENN GIBBONS ON WALTERS SHIFTING LOYALTIES
Denial is a natural and convenient refuge whenever crisis invades the affairs of man, and nowhere in recent times has the phenomenon been more visible or more vehement than in the aftermath of the liquidation of Rangers Football Club.
Nobody could reasonably take exception to dedicated supporters fighting their team’s corner in the event of perceived attacks from numerous quarters, but when defiance spills over into delusion, the truly relevant and potentially most harmful fundamental problems tend to be neglected in the cause of impulsive and ill-conceived retaliation.
Hence the readiness of too many of the Ibrox club’s followers over the past few years not only to acclaim, but to go to war on behalf of a succession of extremely unreliable (and generally self-styled) “redeemers”, from David Murray through Craig Whyte to Charles Green and sundry other figures of dubious motives and character.
The most remarkable and unfathomable aspect of the support for the various liberty takers is that so many should rush to demonstrate such vociferous and frequently hostile allegiance to men whose “credentials” sprang mainly from hearsay, or, more often, from ill-informed media speculation.
Yet Murray, whose excesses initiated the economic devastation that made the club vulnerable to the predatory and plundering Whyte and Green, was allowed to enjoy without a murmur of suspicion from anyone connected to Ibrox 20 years of steady, but unrelieved, erosion of its finances.
When the former director, the late Hugh Adam, made his apocalyptic assessment of the Murray modus operandi, he was shouted down as merely a bitter ex-employee. As far as can be ascertained, none of his detractors so far has admitted that everything Adam predicted has come to pass.
At the first whisper from outside observers of Whyte’s potential for inflicting further damage on Rangers, there were marches in his defence on the BBC headquarters in Glasgow and, of course, the hundreds-strong protest outside the empty SFA offices at Hampden Park one gloriously comical Saturday morning.
Green was another hero originally the object of adulation and undying devotion on the grounds that he and his consortium had rescued the club from extinction by producing the funds to acquire its assets, while other supposed saviours simply made inconsequential noises.
Now, following his return in the decidedly nebulous role of “consultant”, Green appears to attract new levels of hissing from the faithful with each passing day. To borrow from Terry Jones in Monty Python’s Life Of Brian, they were not Messiahs, they were very naughty boys.
All of this turmoil was bound to leave a support as broadly-based as that commanded by the Ibrox club as disarrayed as the institution itself, with internet forums throbbing with charge and counter-charge among fans who, ironically, share the primary wish of seeing their team achieve a new pre-eminence.
Yet, despite the cause and effect of the present chaos, there remains a puzzling insistence among the overwhelming majority of football reporters that Walter Smith remains “the only man the fans can trust.”
This is a distinction that hardly squares with Smith’s own inconstancy since the descent towards liquidation began early last year. Having fronted a consortium said to have included the billionaire businessman, Jim McColl, in a late bid to foil the takeover by the Green group, and having followed this with an entreaty to fans not to buy season tickets on the grounds that the new owners could not be trusted, Smith was curiously happy to accept a non-executive directorship (reputedly for a substantial honorarium) when it was offered by Green.
By the time he accepted the invitation to assume the chairmanship three months ago, Smith had been strangely quiet throughout his time on the board, a silence that would continue after his elevation. Throughout the turbulence, he has demonstrated a propensity for shifting loyalties that seems unbecoming for an aspiring – and inspiring – leader.
Indeed, Smith’s rather fluid sense of loyalty and allegiance recalls a line from Robert Bolt’s play, A Man For All Seasons. Berating his son-in-law, Will Roper, over his changeable, on-off relationship with the church, Thomas More tells him: “We must just pray that when your head stops spinning, your face is to the front again.”
Despite his history of vacillation and being satisfyingly rewarded at Ibrox, when Smith quit this week (he had been Green’s enemy, then his ally, and now he’s reverted to enmity), he triggered an extraordinary series of eulogies. One newspaper article described his efforts on Rangers’ behalf in these hard times as “valiant” and “selfless”, adjectives that would sit more comfortably on aid workers in the world’s most dangerous places.
Another reminded us of Smith’s imperishable love of the club with the quite absurd claim that he had even relinquished his post as Scotland manager in 2007 to ride to Rangers’ rescue after the team’s slump while in the hands of the hapless Paul le Guen. In recording this act of heroic sacrifice, the author omitted the detail that Smith’s defection from Hampden may have been at least partly inspired by the assurance that he would more than triple his wages.
If there has been so much as implied criticism of Smith’s departure, it has concerned the likelihood that he has left his old ally, Ally, as an easy target for Green’s whimsy. This is as unwarranted as the fawning tributes that would have Smith recognised as a demi-god.
With a seemingly endless string of impulsive, ill-considered and ill-advised outbursts on a range of issues and events – in addition, of course, to too many embarrassing setbacks in competitions at home and in Europe – McCoist has proved perfectly capable of finding trouble on his own.
fortunes favour mibbes
07:35 on 10 August, 2013
Ah, human nature ….you have fallen out with the Board because of the GB situation, so you find you have to start slagging them for their fantastic financial management AND for having the management skills etc which resulted in them recognising the qualities of our fantastc NFL…. Unbelievable ……
I feel strongly that the Board need to urgently work this out with the GB, but that doesn’t, and should, lead to outright condemnation of area of their operations ….unless you are perfect
Another minor example Is that I feel one poster on CQN is a complete and total ignoramous, but some of his posts are excellent …..should I start condemning his excellent posts…?
….and shoul not…!!
Glenn Gibbons: Walter Smith’s shifting loyalties
Walter Smith’s resignation has left Ally McCoist without his key ally in the Ibrox boardroom. Picture: SNS
Walter Smith’s resignation has left Ally McCoist without his key ally in the Ibrox boardroom. Picture: SNS
Published on the 10 August
Denial is a natural and convenient refuge whenever crisis invades the affairs of man, and nowhere in recent times has the phenomenon been more visible or more vehement than in the aftermath of the liquidation of Rangers Football Club.
Nobody could reasonably take exception to dedicated supporters fighting their team’s corner in the event of perceived attacks from numerous quarters, but when defiance spills over into delusion, the truly relevant and potentially most harmful fundamental problems tend to be neglected in the cause of impulsive and ill-conceived retaliation.
Hence the readiness of too many of the Ibrox club’s followers over the past few years not only to acclaim, but to go to war on behalf of a succession of extremely unreliable (and generally self-styled) “redeemers”, from David Murray through Craig Whyte to Charles Green and sundry other figures of dubious motives and character.
The most remarkable and unfathomable aspect of the support for the various liberty takers is that so many should rush to demonstrate such vociferous and frequently hostile allegiance to men whose “credentials” sprang mainly from hearsay, or, more often, from ill-informed media speculation.
Yet Murray, whose excesses initiated the economic devastation that made the club vulnerable to the predatory and plundering Whyte and Green, was allowed to enjoy without a murmur of suspicion from anyone connected to Ibrox 20 years of steady, but unrelieved, erosion of its finances.
When the former director, the late Hugh Adam, made his apocalyptic assessment of the Murray modus operandi, he was shouted down as merely a bitter ex-employee. As far as can be ascertained, none of his detractors so far has admitted that everything Adam predicted has come to pass.
At the first whisper from outside observers of Whyte’s potential for inflicting further damage on Rangers, there were marches in his defence on the BBC headquarters in Glasgow and, of course, the hundreds-strong protest outside the empty SFA offices at Hampden Park one gloriously comical Saturday morning.
Green was another hero originally the object of adulation and undying devotion on the grounds that he and his consortium had rescued the club from extinction by producing the funds to acquire its assets, while other supposed saviours simply made inconsequential noises.
Now, following his return in the decidedly nebulous role of “consultant”, Green appears to attract new levels of hissing from the faithful with each passing day. To borrow from Terry Jones in Monty Python’s Life Of Brian, they were not Messiahs, they were very naughty boys.
All of this turmoil was bound to leave a support as broadly-based as that commanded by the Ibrox club as disarrayed as the institution itself, with internet forums throbbing with charge and counter-charge among fans who, ironically, share the primary wish of seeing their team achieve a new pre-eminence.
Yet, despite the cause and effect of the present chaos, there remains a puzzling insistence among the overwhelming majority of football reporters that Walter Smith remains “the only man the fans can trust.”
This is a distinction that hardly squares with Smith’s own inconstancy since the descent towards liquidation began early last year. Having fronted a consortium said to have included the billionaire businessman, Jim McColl, in a late bid to foil the takeover by the Green group, and having followed this with an entreaty to fans not to buy season tickets on the grounds that the new owners could not be trusted, Smith was curiously happy to accept a non-executive directorship (reputedly for a substantial honorarium) when it was offered by Green.
By the time he accepted the invitation to assume the chairmanship three months ago, Smith had been strangely quiet throughout his time on the board, a silence that would continue after his elevation. Throughout the turbulence, he has demonstrated a propensity for shifting loyalties that seems unbecoming for an aspiring – and inspiring – leader.
Indeed, Smith’s rather fluid sense of loyalty and allegiance recalls a line from Robert Bolt’s play, A Man For All Seasons. Berating his son-in-law, Will Roper, over his changeable, on-off relationship with the church, Thomas More tells him: “We must just pray that when your head stops spinning, your face is to the front again.”
Despite his history of vacillation and being satisfyingly rewarded at Ibrox, when Smith quit this week (he had been Green’s enemy, then his ally, and now he’s reverted to enmity), he triggered an extraordinary series of eulogies. One newspaper article described his efforts on Rangers’ behalf in these hard times as “valiant” and “selfless”, adjectives that would sit more comfortably on aid workers in the world’s most dangerous places.
Another reminded us of Smith’s imperishable love of the club with the quite absurd claim that he had even relinquished his post as Scotland manager in 2007 to ride to Rangers’ rescue after the team’s slump while in the hands of the hapless Paul le Guen. In recording this act of heroic sacrifice, the author omitted the detail that Smith’s defection from Hampden may have been at least partly inspired by the assurance that he would more than triple his wages.
If there has been so much as implied criticism of Smith’s departure, it has concerned the likelihood that he has left his old ally, Ally, as an easy target for Green’s whimsy. This is as unwarranted as the fawning tributes that would have Smith recognised as a demi-god.
With a seemingly endless string of impulsive, ill-considered and ill-advised outbursts on a range of issues and events – in addition, of course, to too many embarrassing setbacks in competitions at home and in Europe – McCoist has proved perfectly capable of finding trouble on his own.
Saturday Times …hilarious article re Sally … ” inside Ibrox”…, resilient McCoist
All about his unflappable tenacity …great ….the less they mention his atrocious managerial capability …the longer he’ll remain in situ
Delicious irony that super Sally’s cheeky chappy all pals approach with the hoardes is driving them head long into the mire ….lmfao
Can I ask fellow posters to honestly consider the gg article and put ourselves in their brogues.
Would we read that and join the dots …… or …. see it as the establishment trying to dupe us again
If anyone thinks that the PLC’s attempts to rid themselves of the ‘troublesome’ GB have anything to do with our joining the EPL -well its time to wake up. we have absolutely no chance of joining the EPL – The English do not want us there and that is a fact. All the talk about former soviet counties leagues merging and setting a precedent has no relevance to our situation they were all fairly recently playing in the same league anyway so there Is a sound logic behind the idea whereas we have always plied our trade in the Scottish football league structure. However should Scotland gain a semblance of independence in the referendum I a can guarantee that any miniscule chance that we could somehow join the English league system will evaporate. Not a clarion call for a no vote – just logic dictating that if It were to happen it would finally end any aspirations of our moving.
Pf
Heard some jokers mention judging swally when his team is on the park…. ffs… this is his 3rd season as manager
1st season he had a 3 in a row team and we handed them a massive lead in the first few months.
….pfayr
08:51 on 10 August, 2013
….and, if all these signings he has made take the 3rd Division by storm, (LOL) we won’t hear the end of it…..until Xmas, when they go belly-up again (pardon the phun)…
TBJ
I’ve been fed that line too
Asked them how many cups they wanted to be chipped out of in the first round
However, did advise them I thought he was doing a sterling job ;-)
67
THEY …. can only go belly up for a first time.
Alistair may have went belly up often
Good mid-morning all from a dry bright and almost sunny East Kilbride.
Time to run…
PF
Guy on snyde last night asking if swally would have survived if he had not been swally.
Keevins asked why as a celtic supporter he would be interested.
Michael said … why presume im a celtic supporter
Keevins asked … who do you support.
Michael answers I support myself
Keevins then tries to give the guy a hard time for not telling the truth.
Michael comes back with… i want ally to stay for years… celtic will win everything
Keevins then asks why he lied about not being a celtic fan… michael says he didn’t lie. . Just didn’t answer question … same as the pundits dont answer questions put to them.
Some good news for all Italian based Tims.
Celtic v Liverpool being shown live on Sportitalia.
Sky channel 225.
Freeview channel 60.
KO 1800 local time.
Smashin’!
HH!!
Morning from the Ayrshire is Green and White area..
Is sunny and the Scotsman has been bought and digested, that kind of journalism will never take off
Unlike Walter… take off…! Get it.. take off, he’s away, resigned… eh..?
HH
Jobo
Sunny cambuslang…. run this way ;)
Micktt
Waldo has changed his catchphrase from watp… to… I’ll be back ;)
the boy jinky
08:59 on 10 August, 2013
Hahahahaha …..l as soon as I wrote “belly”, wondervwhy I thought of sally…….
Apologies for my spelling, Fholks ….. My back is giving me jip this morning and ‘posting’ is taking my mind off it….. Well, that’s my latest excuse. Hehe…!!!!
Made me laugh.
http://bassdogs.tumblr.com/
micktt
09:06 on 10 August, 2013
Well, at least your jokes are better than mine…..hehe
67
Well hopefully like kelvin Wilson. . Your bad back heads south soon
the boy jinky
09:05 on 10 August, 2013
Fantastic ….. Shug will be still reeling….. Cretin, who earns a living by being nasty ….. And have you noticed that he only asks that question when zombies 2 are being slagged ….
the boy jinky
09:11 on 10 August, 2013
It has, right down my leg to my foot ….hahahaha…..
67
Michael should have answered …. I will tell you who I support when you tell us who you support
67
Sciatica ……. the italian defender were after ;)))
Could someone clarify what the ASA was referring to the other day ?
There was some debate but I may have missed the conclusion.
P
the boy jinky
09:19 on 10 August, 2013
If his back is OK, we could do a swap…..my back for his ….. Hahahaha
.
Re;The Gibbons Article..
If Only he would have Mentioned that Charlie ‘Bought’ Walter and brought him on Board..
2 DAYS Before ST Renewal..
And Then..OH MY GOSH..
Charlie came back..
then Walter Left..
The Day after ST Sales were Suspended..
Hmmmm
Summa
the boy jinky
09:18 on 10 August, 2013
Michael should have resisted calling the wee shoite in the first place……!!!!!!!!
Glenn Gibbons is verily worth his very own CQN hyperlink this morning.
Charles Green should take notes on how to properly describe a spade:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/glenn-gibbons-walter-smith-s-shifting-loyalties-1-3039381
67heaven … i am neil lennon..!!.. ibrox belongs to the creditors
09:09 on 10 August, 2013the boy jinky08:59 on 10 August, 2013Hahahahaha …..l as soon as I wrote “belly”, wondervwhy I thought of sally…….Apologies for my spelling, Fholks ….. My back is giving me jip this morning and ‘posting’ is taking my mind off it….. Well, that’s my latest excuse. Hehe…!!!!
Awe this is comedy gold on here! Right….
What ye call a deer with no eyes
Nae eye dear…
Ho ho ho
HH
summa of sammi….
09:23 on 10 August, 2013
.
ABSOLUTELY SPOT ON ….. silly bhuns