Before this Europa League group got underway the trips to Istanbul and Amsterdam looked daunting. Those games produced two credible draws, but things went wildly wrong elsewhere.
Our goal last night was a peach. Dedryck Boyata split the Fenerbahce defence to open up space for Mikael Lustig to cross for Kris Commons, who peeled off his marker to create the space to head home. Unfortunately only one point was collected as we lost another Keystone Cops goal.
Craig Gordon seems to be struck by a lack of conviction this season. His was not the only failing at our repeated corner kick fiascos but letting a ball trickle through his legs as he appeared caught in two minds is indicative of a player who is doubting himself.
You know Kris Commons scores and creates huge goals for Celtic, we’ve discussed it often enough here. Despite his veteran status and apparent ill-fitting to our system he remains by far our most effective player.
For Ronny, it didn’t go wrong in Europe this season against Fenerbahce or Ajax (I’m absolving him of blame for Efe’s error or a last minute breakaway goal at Celtic Park), it went wrong home and away to Molde and Malmo. We appeared to underestimate both. Did the manager have something to prove against fellow Norwegian managers?
Celtic dominated possession stats in all four games against Molde and Malmo but the Scandinavians exploited the acres of space which simply didn’t exist in our games against Ajax, Fenerbahce or Qarabag, for that matter. Ajax, Fenerbahce and Qarabag got the respect they deserved, not so Molde and Malmo.
The failure is, of course, more complicated than that. Jozo missed the bulk of the campaign, while Dedryck is only just beginning to look like a footballer (lovely pass for the goal last night). Scott Allan looks promising, but we’ve not seen enough of him either due to injury.
Curiously, Ronny’s big 2015 No. 1 striker target, Nadir, looks less like a Ronny Deila player than anyone we’ve bought in years. Knowing we were interested in him, I watched his performances against Celtic last season, and made the same observation at the time.
What happens if your keeper’s form falls off a cliff, one of your new defenders doesn’t settle quickly, two other new players miss months through injury, and your new striker doesn’t morph into a different player? You finish bottom of the Europa League group.
Celtic must now consider their strategy for January. Successive transfer windows have left us weaker, not stronger. Identify the reasons, remediate and we can build on the away performances which bookended this Europa League campaign.
Check out the CQNBookstore. There’s 15 great Celtic books and 10 DVDs, you’ll love them.
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Just caught the panel after mk Dons Ipswich match
They were speaking about Aberdeen game then went onto discuss how league misses Rangers and how demoting them turned out to be a mistake .. Unbelievable .
Oh and apparently Celtic had another bad result in Europe mid week.., Deary me.
Jungle Jim Hot Smoked
I to read Tom English article. It was well written with some very pertinent points about what has happened at Celtic over the last few seasons. You have concluded that Tom English wants RD sacked, Celtic ARE a very poor side at the moment, but he asked a question, a very valid one, based on the facts the has written into his piece. He asks why they are not under pressure, and again, looking at what he has written about the failures in Europe so far, it is a totally valid request. It does not, by any stretch of the imagination, say that he wants RD sacked por cierto
Good Afternoon.
Here’s a short piece about the world’s worst team of ‘All-Stars’…
https://theclumpany.wordpress.com/2015/12/11/all-conquering-heroes/
I admire those who are blindly faithful through and through. I do wonder with those seeking the status quo what their ambitions are? I guess we all use different yardsticks – I think most of us can see that. I know most can also see the constraints we are operating with.
For me if I honest I’ve lost the notion that we can be a club that can grow in to a last 16 CL team. It might happen one year in 5 if we are lucky… However I’m not prepared for us being degraded to a team who can’t make it beyond Christmas in the Europa league.
Difficult to know what we should be but if we could be a post Christmas Europa team 4 years out of 5 with a last 16 CL appearance twice a decade Id take that
For a wee example.
Id like to see Tom English have a wee debate with Auldheid.
I know who would come out ahead.
It wouldn’t be the SMSM hack:)
HH
Someone posted this morning that he thought Aberdeen were good value at evens.
I’m sure no Hearts defenders were lurking at the time!
Por Cierto
I have to go otherwise I would argue my case that it is not a well written article in terms of impartiality.For the moment, you think it is and I think it is not.
Cheerio,
JJ
worst ever cheat- Sir Div the original spiv
worst ever liquidation- alas it happened
worst ever fraud -still to be decided!
worst ever myth – same club shite.
worst ever Discount option Scheme disclosure- See Campbell Ogilvie
worst ever Employee benefit trust disclosure
worst ever 1 way agreement concerning constituent parts of SFA n’its wean.
worst ever at investigating the sources,origins and bisniss lojik-Sir Dave in liquidation run up
worst ever fitba fans if ye think this tosh and criminality is goin to be foisted on us.
worst ever suprise comin!
The cheek of a complicit media talking down our game because the criminality in our game does not have its entitlement back is sickening.
They brought it on themselves!
worst ever results-i note yir sales are declining,
repitition of a statement dont make it correct.especially when its wrong
worst ever comparison :-))-http://itsanewclub.blogspot.co.uk/
:-)
HH
Maybe the young Hearts defender mistook Thompson for Steven McLean and thought there was no danger of a penalty being given for handball.
http://itsanewclub.blogspot.co.uk/
:-)
I will go further….there are loads of good posters on CQN, who would rip any Scoddish Meeja hack to shreads.
Like taking candy from a baby.
There is strength in numbers and intelligence.
Don’t believe the hype…..Hun Journos can hardly string a sentence together, never mind influence Celtic fans.
HH
Liverpool 2 Celtic 0 at Chester
nae luck,2 late goals did us
HH
TGM
Auldheid has forgotten more than Tom English will ever know, and that is a FACT.
HH
TET
Of that, I have no doubt whatsoever.
Maybe its time there was a concerted effort to debate these Scoddish Meeja fools.
We should challenge their hun rhetoric.
HH
Cultsbhoy @ 2.59
Blindly faithful through and through?
You don’t get to Celtic Park to enjoy the match day experience in 2015 nor Istanbul for that matter, by blindness.
If they, we, all suddenly drifted from doing it, there would be no visionary Celtic for the “ I stopped going years ago “ Brigade to aspire to, on the internet, especially for the ones that kept their CQN Log In, for times of emergency.
‘Concept of football forum lost on poster using football forum?’ I don’t think so.
Calling people names, or incompetent, wanting their head because in their opinions ‘they don’t rate them’ is a pure waste of broadband. The notion to judge RD solely on Celtic’s euro record is a non sequitur, despite the obvious malevolence from a rabid Rangers deprived SMSM.
Most Celtic fans know that the constraints you mention are here to stay, deal with it and move on. The dust of Europe will settle and Celtic will continue to win the league, they’ll get a manager the Ronny haters, don’t hate, and we’ll all live happily in a green submarine.
Now that our disappointing season in Europe has come to an end all eyes are on the draw for next summer’s European Championships in France and who the Republic’s opponents will be. I see media reports are widely reporting that Roy Hodgson does not want to get Ireland in his group not surprising seeing they have not beaten us in the last five attempts. Would be a great draw for us to get the English. Some great sport on TV to-day and looking forward to the Celts match against the Saints.
BSR
You are probably right… But what is your yardstick?
BSR
I don’t think there are many Ronnie haters btw. I don’t even think many totally don’t rate his potential – I’ll be interested to see where he ends up in 10 years from now.
Tavernier scores again …………………
:-)
I have had the misfortune to listen to Tom English a couple of times on Radio Scotland. I have yet to hear him say anything positive about Celtic. He tries to give the impression he is impartial while, imo, he despises us. Fits right in with the prevailing culture there, of course. Again, imo, he and Bonnar are among the worst of the lot.
Who is Bonnar ?
Ronny Deila has been given an opportunity with a huge and famous club. Based on his experience in his homeland,he has attempted to improve various aspects of each of the playing staff.
Whether it be adhering to tactics,diet,playing to the system,that is what he has asked the players to do.
I’m Ronny. This is what I would like you to do.
I posted after the Legia game that the players who cost us that game better wisen up cos Lenny ain’t coming back. RD has been hamstrung from Day One by a DOF in the boardroom and a bunch of arseholes in the dressing room.
IMO…
All it needs in any workplace is a voice of dissent,and it to be taken up by a few others.
Our bunch of dissenters need to take one good look at themselves and ask a very simple question or two.
One-if I play shite for this manager,am I likely to get a big-money move?
Two-if I don’t get my finger out my arse is my career screwed because I was a daft wee boy listening to a senior pro?
Cultsbhoy
After MON if the Celtic shortlists taught me anything, it was not to set the bar too high.
With that in mind ultimately it’s to prevail and remain unique.
The size of the stadium and increasingly dormant support, means were down from peak to trough, in the life of Celtic. The fact that we now have disaffected fans that wouldn’t go even if they could, is just a passage of time that has to be toughed out.
When we lost tactically to Malmo and the EL draw was made I couldn’t see where the points would come from, and thought we were correctly outsiders with Molde.
The game has changed forever pure inventive beautiful football within our present constraints won’t get us to where we should be in the last sixteen of the CL.
BMCUWP
That’s fair evaluation nd comment.
Ronny was caught betwixt and between , having to rely on one (at least) of those who took umberage.
Ronny, it would seem made a cumbersome entrance.
TGM
Banging your head off the wall mi amigo, the smsm have it all sewn up.
HH
……………………..
BobbyM
Nail on the head mi amigo.
HH
Premier league international cup
Liverpool 2 Celtic )
http://www.celticfc.net/news/9704?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
HH
BIGCUPWINNERS
I was in my bed when you posted a reply to a comment yesterday.
Otherwise I might have had to say-yeah damn right.
It’s a nightmare situation. We’ve ran out of money and we’ve ran out of quality.
Ran out of hope anaw.
Seriously,I once looked forward to a game to cheer me up,sad git that I was.
Now,it’s pushing me over the edge thinking about how we are being raped.
Is it too late for a weather report? Wet and miserable here on Dublin’s Nortside. Coat and brolly a must.
Woke up to a Hooped jersey. Celtic dressing gown and Celtic Shop voucher, so despite the weather I’ll enjoy the umpteenth anniversary of my my 21st birthday.
Here’s a famous Christmas song with a twist:
http://youtu.be/L_fwX2NChmw
Ronnie is a nice guy and perhaps a decent coach but a manager he isn’t!
Like the late great Tommy Burns he has been given the job years before he merited it.
Through his inexperience and desire to play “the Celtic way” Tommy always thought the answer was another forward. In the end we had real quality there – in fact perhaps too much but unfortunately we couldn’t defend to save ourselves! I gave up on TB that day at the bigotdome when with some five star forwards on the park, including Tommy Johnston(£2M), we couldn’t hold on to a lead against a lower league team, as CFC supporters fought with one another all round the ground!
Same with Ronnie – to persist with a set up that we just don’t have the players to play is to me either stupidity or arrogance! Either way it ain’t working and against better teams than the dross in Scotland will be continually exposed. On Thursday night if the guy had not been sent off we would never have gotten the draw. Even after he was sent off we fashioned ONE attempt on goal in 30 minutes!
Winning a treble would be good but given the rock bottom standard of the opposition – proved by their results in Europe- to me it would be far removed from the achievements of Mr Stein and MON.
Sadly I fear that the board will take the line of least activity and let Ronnie have another go at the CL. However they will also probably fail to back him properly in the transfer windows and so we will all be back in August debating the same failings. It is a long time. Since I was so apathetic about our team and I believe that many of our support are in the same boat. The whole club needs to be reinvigorated from top to bottom!
HH
Dundee Utd look like goners this early
I don’t know what it was for but I notice Mcginn has received a straight red.
Less than 24hrs after I stated he looks like he’s lost his rashness.
Curseofthecommentator csc
HH
Hibs & Sevco both level in their games. Bolton 1 down.
How to deal with cold callers.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/cold-callers-best-ways-to-get-rid-a6770256.html
For all their mega bucks spending – Manchester city look a poor team apart from a few sparkling performances each season.
Goal for Morton, camon Ref get it sorted
YEE HA Morton 2 Sevco 1 (8 minutes left).
Mon Hibs gies a goal
Looks like the Hibs challenge has gone