Lessons to learn from Pukki mistake

1527

Teemu Pukki’s permanent move to Brondby for a reported £500k is good business for a player who never came close to commanding a regular starting place at Celtic.  While we did well exiting him from Celtic Park but his arrival two years ago is worthy of review.

He came from Schalke as a 23-year-old, having been at Sevilla as a teenager and scoring slightly better than one in two in Finland.  Even his Schalke stats were decent, 8 goals in 7 starts and 30 appearances from the bench, which for a sparingly used young player is around the mark expected.  On paper, Teemu looked a good fit for us, so do we have anything to learn?

For a start, being able to score goals in the Bundesliga does not guarantee you will be able to translate this into an even better scoring rate in Scotland.  We have made similar mistakes when recruiting strikers from Spain in recent seasons.  For all our lack of financial clout, delivering in Scotland is not an easy task.

There is a whole world of potential issues around psychology, motivation and appetite, which I regularly hear cited about players from people in the game.  For the most part, I reckon these are excuses to bridge the unexplained gap between expectation and outcome.  You get the odd indulgent nutcase, but most players have an overwhelming sense of their need to maximise their commercial value by delivering on the park.  I suspect Teemu is no different.

Whatever the reason behind him not fitting at Celtic, the exercise cost us not only the £1.5m net loss on transfer fees, and wages paid, but more importantly the failure to kick on from reaching the last 16 of the Champions League in season 2012-13.

There’s a truth in the game which has stood the test of time: only people who watch a player week-in-week-out know his true value.  Schalke fans would have told us things about Teemu which we can tell others about John Guidetti.  John will pick up a club keen to exploit his untapped potential.  A year from now they will be a little wiser.

Our lesson: scouting is the only important part of recruitment, stats, references and YouTube clips don’t count.

Our friends at Magners have offered us two of the new Celtic away jerseys.  It’s another fantastic offer from Celtic’s main sponsor, my thanks to them.  In order to win, answer the following question:

Which team won this year’s Premiership Play-off final 6-1 on aggregate?  Put the answer in the SUBJECT line of your email to celticquicknews@gmail.com

Competition closes at midnight TONIGHT, so get busy, these are two great prizes and there’s less than a 12 hour window to win them.

And………….. while you’re entering, you might want to kick a pound or two towards our Marys’ Meals Malawi school kitchen appeal.  Thank you.

And #2, if you enter, check your inbox for a response over the weekend.  There’s a home shirt unclaimed from a similar competition last month!

Click Here for Comments >
Share.

About Author

1,527 Comments
  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. ...
  4. 5
  5. 6
  6. 7
  7. 8
  8. 9
  9. 10
  10. 11
  11. ...
  12. 40

  1. Dontbrattbakkinanger on

    Any day you see an ole red kite is a good day

     

     

    DBBIA/milvus milvusreturnsCSC [thumbs up]

  2. i'vehadtochangemyname on

    apologies to them what live in Scotland innit and have to put up with them on a daily basis but I Iove the smsm because they are killing the hordes what are already dead by feeding thems shipe they’re too thick to see through.

     

     

    btw anybody ever had money thrown at them from the flats above by their gran to get stuff from the van cos I work with a great Joanna whose gran would have called her janna and threw money at her to get milk etc from the van

  3. Ah, Fixture announcement day!

     

     

    I used to LOVE that in the 70s & 80s. I would first scan to see when the first OF game would be. Then I would go back and work out the possible point accumulation between us and them before the first 6 pointer. Concern would build as I saw that we would have Aberdeen and Dundee United away in the first quarter whereas THEY would have them at home.

     

     

    Then I would consider that by the time we played them in game 8 or 9 we would be in a situation where we might have to win at Ibrox just to keep the season alive!

     

     

    Today, i haven’t really bothered to see who we’re playing when.

     

     

    Want them back though? Nah!

     

     

    I’m happy to settle back and see which MIB will deprive us of the treble this season!!

  4. I too watched in amazement and horror as danny McGrain tried to teach Amido how to trap a ball at half time.

     

     

    He did score a screamer once he’s left us to go on loan. Here it is.

     

     

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lbIY-vjGcCc

     

     

    I would be so bold as to suggest that it wasn’t completely representative of his overall potential!

     

     

    HH JamesGang

  5. Shuggiebhoy67

     

     

    I have chosen science.Not for me the ramblings of ignorant tent dwellers of 2000+ years ago who have no knowledge of mankind of today,they remain as representative of their time and confined to the bin of history.

     

     

    ———

     

     

    So no Eurocamp holiday for you this summer then?

     

     

    HH JamesGang

  6. The Pantaloon Duck on

    Jamesgang – I think that’s the *only* goal he has scored since going out on loan…

  7. starry plough

     

     

    18:55 on 19 June, 2015

     

    Sandman

     

     

    12 oot wan in, sounds like everything is just peachy in the Govan Garden:))

     

     

    ——–

     

     

    Mark my words yon Chinese international will make as big an impression for thems as du Wei did for us.

     

     

    HH JamesGang

  8. Dontbrattbakkinanger on

    Supercoisty at the Royal Highland Show, hopin’ his beetroot will win a rosette to cover some of the tatty asbestos in the Blue Room.

  9. the pantaloon duck

     

     

    You’re probably right!

     

     

    I scored one like that once. Complete miracle. Was the week before my birthday and my kids – though tiny at the time – told me God had given me my present early by making me Henrik for 5 secs in my life.

     

     

    That worked for me!

     

     

    I wouldn’t buy me though! And nor should Celtic!

     

     

    HH JamesGang

  10. jamesgang 19:33

     

     

    Hoy!

     

    ………………..pick on someone your own size.

     

     

    :-)

  11. starry plough

     

     

    19:45 on 19 June, 2015

     

    jamesgang

     

     

    Grasshoppa:))

     

     

    ——-

     

     

    Fekin spacehopper mare like!!!!!

     

     

    ;-)))

     

     

    HH JamesGang

  12. googybhoy ♥ celtic

     

    19:34 on

     

    19 June, 2015

     

    Guidetti playing for Sweden u 21 now v Italy on BT Sport.

     

     

    Stick £100 on him to equalise.

     

     

    He did that yesterday when the game was shown “live” :-)

  13. Who was the other Chinese bhoy, Strachan signed on loan from Charlton.

     

    I’m sure he pitched him in for his debut in a 4-2 win versus the old club Rangers

  14. Praecepta

     

     

    Touché!

     

    Or was it touche?

     

     

    Good comeback you old fox you!

     

     

    HH JamesGang

  15. Ah the very one….Zheng Zhi …

     

    To be fair, the guy looked to have decent technique…. I just think the hyper-bowl that is Scottish fitba , is just too much for them

  16. Tallybhoy

     

     

    Just as well you posted that – joined the game late and thought that was a hell of short half-time interval. Doh!

  17. The Pantaloon Duck on

    lennon’s passion

     

     

    19:47 on 19 June, 2015

     

    Rafael Scheidt,Du Wei and Amido start of a super team

     

     

    – don’t forget Braafheid!

  18. glendalystonsils on

    The Pantaloon Duck

     

     

     

    Surely you mean ‘World Cup Final,’ Braafheid >)

  19. Butsybhoy: See you Sunday.

     

     

    Mike in Toronto: Get in touch with me through BMCUWP and I’ll try and sort something out for you when you are over. ClogherCelt would probably be interested as well.

     

     

     

    Is 1st August confirmed or might that fixture be moved to the Sunday?

     

     

    Alreadybookedmyflightscsc

  20. Campbell Dallas LLP, were appointed administrators for The Arches, Glasgow on 18 June 2015.

     

     

    Today, 24 hours later, they made 129 of the 133 workforce redundant and the Arches has closed down.

     

     

    http://www.thearches.co.uk

     

     

    So we can now see the farce that was the DuffNPhelps circus at oldco.

     

     

    Who advised DumbandDuffer that oldco should not be treated as any other company in adminiistration?

     

     

    They continued to trade, they continued to incur debt, they continued run at a loss, they continued to fail to pay unsecured creditors.

     

     

    Oh and DumbandDuffer ran up a multi-million pound bill while failing to fulfill their obligations: Save the company if at all possible and get as much as you can for the creditors.

     

     

    The company was liquidated and creditors got nothing.

     

     

    Wonder how that criminal case is going?

     

     

    FabricofScottishSociety CSC

  21. Lennon n Mc....Mjallby on

    Shuggiebhoy

     

     

    Fair play bhud,just remember and think on this,when Einstein was asked if he believed in an afterlife he replied that when all energy dies it must turn into another type of energy……

     

     

    the appliance of science

     

     

    zanussicsc

     

     

    HH

  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. ...
  4. 5
  5. 6
  6. 7
  7. 8
  8. 9
  9. 10
  10. 11
  11. ...
  12. 40