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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CELTIC will face a UEFA hearing on December 16 after fans let off flares during last night’s Europa League clash game against Fenerbahce in Istanbul.
Three flares were lit in the away end during the 1-1 draw and were reported to the European game’s governing body.
Now UEFA have this afternoon confirmed that Celtic will have a case to answer.
The club has been charged with the “setting off of fireworks” under article 16 (2) of the disciplinary regulations and the case will be heard by the Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body next Wednesday (December 16).
Celtic must now consider their strategy for January. Successive transfer windows have left us weaker, not stronger.
Paul, you are in danger of being struck off PL Christmas card list.
campaign. – See more at: http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/lack-of-respect-for-molde-and-malmo/#sthash.UidvALGr.dpuf
Hebcelt I must also be thick :-)
!!BADA BING!! on 11TH DECEMBER 2015 3:49 PM
QUONNO-true mate,but the total spend on dud strikers is shocking,Park should be chased for continually wasting our money
Nobody has questioned the mechanics of signings more than me.
Still want to know exactly who gets what from signings.
– See more at: http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/lack-of-respect-for-molde-and-malmo/comment-page-3/#comment-2735412
We light one flare at an away euro game in a cauldron of hostility and pyrotechnics and we’re known as ‘the flare lighters’.
The Huns pump a thousand goats at ludge parties all over Scotland and they’re known as…’RRRangerrs.’
CELTIC have basically said here’s your rope – and we’ve allowed ourselves and others to hang us.” That statement amounts to an admission of assisted suicide from Scotland’s most controversial group of football fans.
Fêted by Rod Stewart and lauded by England manager Roy Hodgson, the Green Brigade – Celtic’s group of “self-styled ultras” or hardcore fans – appears to have lost its war with the club and the goodwill of fellow supporters.
In the last month, the Green Brigade’s love/hate relationship with Celtic’s hierarchy has become one of just hate. One of its politically charged banners landed the club with another fine from European football’s governing body last week, and its association with the damage at Motherwell’s Fir Park stadium caused by setting off pyrotechnic flares and the breaking of seats is likely to see the club’s place in the experiment of Friday night football pulled.
As a result, more than 120 of the Green Brigade’s members and associates are suspended from Celtic Park, and its notorious Section 111 within the ground has been broken up.
In the popular imagination, they have had their status as Scottish football’s bête noir confirmed, shifting from a noisy, colourful, provocative and politically confrontational group to essentially hooligans with a fondness for Irish Republican paramilitaries.
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Police Scotland, determined to make the contentious Offensive Behaviour at Football Act work, and whose officers have had regular brushes with the Green Brigade, could not have wished for better headlines.
It all seems a long way from their pivotal role in making nights like last season’s win over Barcelona among the best in living memory.
“Celtic have done what the police couldn’t do and that’s put the game beyond repair for us,” one member of the Green Brigade told the Sunday Herald.
“Will it end the group? Well, it could go either way, limping on and people could then chuck it. The moment might have gone. Lots of things are mounting up. The harassment from the cops and Celtic takes its toll.
“But when we got this thing going we were underground. We were raw. But we lost that. We went from one end of the spectrum to being in Rod Stewart’s book. The kids have ripped it up in the last weeks. I think we all have.”
The Green Brigade has a core of around 80 members, a decision-making inner circle of around 30 and a wider associated circle in its section within Celtic Park of around 350 people. Its successful underground merchandising operation would give the impression of a much larger group, however.
Police Scotland admits the group are not “casuals”. It has dismissed links with illegal groups in Northern Ireland, but expressed concern about the group’s use of pyrotechnics, the “vulnerability” of younger members and breaching the Offensive Behaviour Act via songs the force sees as falling foul of the legislation.
Since the introduction of the legislation, many of the Green Brigade’s members and associates have been arrested and brought to court for a breach of the act.
The Green Brigade was formed by no more than half a dozen members of a previous singing section, the Jungle Bhoys, who became disillusioned with that group around 2005 and wanted something more political which spoke to the Ultras scene of clubs such as Germany’s St Pauli or Livorno in Italy.
Soon they were active at anti-racism and STUC events, but still numbered only around a dozen marching behind their own banners. But when Celtic gave over a section of its ground to the burgeoning group, numbers started to snowball.
“By the time it’s 2010, the group gets Section 111 and we realise we’ve a movement on our hands.
“How do you get in? Well, you’ve got to turn up for games for starters. Then there’s paint nights, helping out with banners, setting up before big games in the ground. It’s almost like having another job and a lot of work goes into it away.
“To get in – it’s almost like an interview with people who are in your wider company. The group’s looking for people with different opinions, but on the three main topics.”
But controversy was never far away. A Remembrance Day banner demanding “No bloodstained poppy on our Hoops” brought widespread condemnation, and a Uefa fine for “illicit chanting” following the singing of songs referring to the IRA during the team’s Europa League run in 2011 was met with the notorious “F**k Uefa” banner at a subsequent game.
But for all his condemnation, Celtic’s chief executive, Peter Lawwell, kept the group on board, an acknowledgement of its input to the atmosphere at an otherwise moribund Celtic Park. Manager Neil Lennon also made a point of singling them out for praise when presented with the League trophy.
The Green Brigade member the Sunday Herald spoke to stands by their banners, including the ones linking IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands to William Wallace. However, several members of the Green Brigade have faced criminal action for singing the anthem Roll Of Honour, which commemorates the hunger strikes through the line “England you’re a monster”. They argue that Flower Of Scotland carries the same sentiment. He said: “The group was becoming part of the Celtic Park experience, part of the day trip; the section isn’t as hardcore as many think.
“But the banners over the last few years haven’t been about pushing the boat out and trying to annoy the club. Every single one of the banners had a deeply held belief and a point behind it.
“Like the Bobby Sands and William Wallace banner. A lot of people were scratching their heads. Even other Celtic fans were asking what this was about. But we knew. Anyone affected by the Offensive Behaviour Act knew. And if your audience is based around people getting arrested at the football, what better audience to make your point in front of?
“Forums and fanzines have had their day. It gets to the point where things build up a head of steam. The Offensive Behaviour Act came in and while people had reservations how it would affect them, it was not until it came in that we knew just how.
“And that’s not just the group. It’s those who were in our wider area and wider social circle. Away games is where the arrests are. Cops picking up easy targets, daft drunk kids who don’t realise the consequences of their actions and whose lives can be ruined for singing a song with their mates.
“And we get the label we do because people in Scotland aren’t willing, even now, to accept Irish Republican views as an acceptable political ideology. Back in the days of the Jungle, no-one was really picking up on this, but the last few years have thrown up a generation of tut-tutters who sang much much worse [songs] than we do now.”
If the knock-out blow was the Motherwell game, then the Green Brigade admit they “took their eye off the ball”. The emergence of a group of affiliated young Turks in the last year, the Style Mile Vandals (SMV) brought the edge of drunkenness and hooliganism to Celtic away fixtures. So who are the SMV?
“Well, they’re kind of the naughty wee brother who got kind of carried away. They’ve been on the go about a year, are younger kids and into graffiti and stuff. These are the guys out late at night putting up stickers and spray painting.
“The Union Bears [Rangers’ ‘ultras’] have something similar. But there’s a huge difference between the SMV and the Green Brigade, even if there’s an overlap of a few members.
“The Green Brigade kind of don’t want the notoriety as individuals; the SMV want to be the big boys. They see themselves as a group within a group and the Green Brigade are annoyed they’ve been pursuing their notoriety.
“My view? The recent pyro stuff hasn’t just been the SMV and the kids around the group. It’s easy enough to find online and it’s also cheap enough to find online and it’s also cheap enough for anyone to buy. However, a lot people need a bogeyman to blame.”
Matron Matron quickly quickly a double dose too a double dose too he actually believes Celtic are good he actually believes Celtic are good he can’t remember the 60’s he can’t remember the 60’s when we were young when we were young and Celtic ruled the world and Celtic ruled the world and the players caught the bus to training and ate chips on the way home and the players caught the bus to training and ate chips on the way home and the club was skint and the club was skint but we ruled the world but we ruled the world.
Feck it Matron be kind be kind, give him the whole feckin jar, give him the whole feckin jar.
SANDMAN on 11TH DECEMBER 2015 3:54 PM
We light one flare at an away euro game in a cauldron of hostility and pyrotechnics and we’re known as ‘the flare lighters’.
The Huns pump a thousand goats at ludge parties all over Scotland and they’re known as…’RRRangerrs.’
As I posted yesterday on another matter. If we continually hand people bullets, then we cannot complain when they fire them.
If identified, last night’s numpties should be banned for life.
– See more at: http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/lack-of-respect-for-molde-and-malmo/comment-page-3/#comment-2735415
St Johnstone, the form team in Scotland, are 9/1 to beat this dreadful Celtic side. If I truly believed that, as many on here seem to, I would be making myself a lot of money on Sunday. St Johnstone are at Home.
Cheerio,
JJ
“Scott A for Kris and I think that’ll be the team.
Kris to come on and get the winner in the 72nd minute.”
See more at: http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/defending-in-europe/comment-page-14/#comments
Oooooh close but no cigar.
And I woulda got away with it if it wasn’t for them meddlin’ Turks. :)
HH
St Johnstone are the 2015 benchmark? They must be good shove a couple of hundred on for me and take the cost out of my winnings.
Woeisme.
Please God don’t let St. Johnstone beat us now, my life would not be worth living.
JJ,
It’s never usually easy up there.
Will Ronny keep up his 100% post euro game record.
Can’t wait.
HH
So what / who was the big departure promised today?
Geordie
Never? Usually?
Mr & Mrs GM
Your son has talent but his recent near brush with success in the Prediction Stakes seems to have distracted from his normal precision in expressing himself.
Mr JJ
Definite cheerio now.
Leave big Cifci alone.we know he isn’t the greatest. but to make him a scapegoat. every time we have a bad result.he is the first to get it along with johanson. the one that’s getting a easy ride on here is Bitton. for me he is to slow.and if celtic get a bid of 10million for him in January. take it no questions asked grab the cash.
welcome back BOABY and KITALBA.
ps now not gloating but what was the big story that was coming out today.
CULTSBHOY CAN NOT RELATE TO CELTIC BOARD AMBITIONS ON OR OFF THE PARK on 11TH DECEMBER 2015 4:10 PM
So what / who was the big departure promised today.
beat me to it.
JJ,
Ha! Go easy on me. It’s Friday :)
Cultsbhoy,
No news so far but to be fair to catman he didn’t promise anything.
HH
TimBhoy3,
I agree 100%. 10 million for Bitton in January is a great deal for us.
Yogi
By Poly Graf 11th December 16:05
Celtic are in talks with a former scout for Celtic to see if she is prepared to accept the role as the Director of Football Operations.
Helena Costa will take over at Celtic this January in an appointment that will almost certainly see Ronnny Deila`s power at the Glasgow giants greatly reduced.
The Portuguese coach spent three years working formally as a player and opposition scout in both her homeland and in Spain for Celtic’s first team between 2008 and 2011.
In an interview earlier this year, Costa said she had maintained her link with the club, providing information on emerging talents in Portugal and Scandinavia.
The 38-year-old will be formally presented as Celtic’s director of football operations at the start of January
A source close to Celtic congratulated Costa on her appointment.
“We would like to congratulate Helena sincerely on taking up this new challenge, we have been following her for a long time and look forward to hooking up with her” a spokesperson for the club told STV.
“She had an excellent interview for us and we know she will give her new position the highest level of commitment and dedication”
“Ronny and Johnny have already taken her too lunch and like what they see”
Costa has most recently been coaching with the Qatar and then Iran women’s national sides.
In a newspaper interview in Portugal in March last year, Costa praised Celtic for giving her the chance to work in the men’s game.
“The club had the courage to bet on me – and I must stress this – and for all I know, I am the only woman in the world to do this,” she said.
“My proposed new role is something of great responsibility, because there are investments of millions, which allows me to be in top level men’s football.
“Opportunities for women in this world are not so many. This side of football and the Glasgow cauldron is something I find very interesting and I’m very much looking forward to it.”
Costa isn’t the first female to take charge of a men’s side in world football.
Carolina Morace was the head coach of Italian Serie C1 side Viterbese in the late 1990s. She lasted two matches before quitting.
Further down the ladder, Croatian Tihana Nemcic was reported to have taken charge of fifth-tier side NK Viktorija Vojakovac in her country two years ago but she had to quit
when she became pregnant after an affair with one of the youth players”
quick quiz –
last couple of days I learned something new about a couple of Celtic players.
Without googling now, be honest ………………..
who knows the middle names of ..
James ? Johnstone
and
John ? Deans
Awe naw,
Wrong person in your Awe nawed article.
New coach is her cousin Howmuchee.
HH
evening all
drink number 1 under way
St.Rochs park nice name.a humble giant
https://twitter.com/StRochsJuniors/status/675350840308318208
HH
Saint Stivs on 11th December 2015 4:38 pm
Jinky is Connely.
Not sure of the spelling.
Night Celts
hail hail
Celtic
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo:
If I am not mistaken, which striker did she previously bring to Celtic just before she left us. I pray to my good God she never steps foot in Parkhead again.
We are tethering on the edge mate. On the feckin edge.
An Tearmann
James McGrory lived not too far down the road from the St Roch`s ground. I don`t know when it acquired the name.
Off out for a pint now. If you see me at the game on the 19th, ask me about James McGrory,
JJ
PS I hope that doesn`t agitate Favourite Uncle 0:-)
Connelly? Make that Forth Road Bridge guy`s name even more enjoyable! Stein Connelly !
Kit,
chin up !!!!
I am off to a Thai wedding now…possibly back on tomorrow
I wish Helena all the best in her new role
HH
Ronny went into the Malmo and Molde games with an arrogant swagger and came out in a humble stagger.
No doubt he went there with a ‘puffed-out’ chest “I’m with the big boys now’ – he let himself and his club down.
He allowed a poor Malmo side humiliate us, with one of his own ‘rejects’ delivering the ‘killer blows’
When will people wake up?
Ronny is a failed experiment and the longer he is there, the longer it will take to fix.
but the huns are coming back… Halleluiah we are saved. Bigotry saved us all. And that is written on the subway walls.
Where a couple of weeks back a couple of very pretty friends of mine, in all sincerity collected cloths and food and money and in the freezing cold with me in toe (only ‘cos I’d run out ofsmokes) we went in search of the homeless. We did not have to look long nor far to find them. Me being a foreigner, I stayed out of it and the girls gave the donations to the needy. And when they did so many men who had walked on by turned back and donated.
Sex sells charity. Or rather pretty girls can if they want to. I’ve seen it.
Maybe Hoopy the Hound should get breast implants and walk the pavement at night.
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo
Chinis(‘s) up mate, but I just can’t look the poor in the eye anymore. Nor listen to Celtic excuses without puking anymore either.
I’m not lost but I’m a stranger to our mission statement and club boasts. Not supporters deeds and sacrifices though.
‘Ronny and Johnny have already taken her to lunch and like what they see’
Sounds like an interesting girl! :)
Didn’t P67 take a cheap dig at Malmo when we drew them.
And I see Collins was sacked as wildly predicted by the in crowd.
Don’t eat yourself now :0)
Kitalba
Y.N.W.A my friend
You come into my thoughts sometimes when you are not posting,
thank you for being you fae yer pal in peeing wae rain Coatbridge.
KITBALA. Fella you did a very good thing may God Bless you. H.H.
Jimmy McGrory
In the summer of 1928 he turned down an offer from Arsenal to become the highest paid footballer in Britain because he could not bear to leave Parkhead. It latterly turned out that the Celtic board were banking on McGrory’s departure as a way of boosting the club’s bank account and so riled were they by his refusal of Arsenal’s offer (£10,0000 transfer) that they secretly paid him less than his team mates for the rest of his career. When he later discovered this dastardly deed McGrory simply said:
“Well it was worth it just to pull on those Green and White Hoops.”