I know I’m not the only one worried about tonight’s game. A few bombscare moments is all it takes to crash out of Europe, think Big Dan in Sion (we don’t get to play a joker every year). We now have four games under our belts but there are still lots of cobwebs to blow away.
On the positive side, we’ve never lost a competitive goal to Swedish opposition and this Celtic squad have the wherewithal to raise their game and see this one through. A week ago we said Kris Commons and Georgios Samaras would be crucial, this will be even more so tonight. Georgios is the most effective ‘out ball’ in the squad, while Kris’ ability to prize open defences has, if anything, improved since the summer break.
Elfsborg are at home tonight after four games on the road. Piling away games together always taxes a team. They will be pleased to be back at the Boras Arena but fine tuning is everything in this business, and apart from the seven goal whipping of Daugava Daugavpils in the last Champions League qualifying round, they have not had a tactically-conventional home game in almost a month.
Take them, Celtic.
Ranger Charity Foundation have, unfortunately, reset the dial on what charities can get away with without consequence. One trustee even refused to answer questions from the Office of the Scottish Charity Register (OSCR), who, incidentally, decided to take no action. OSCR had the temerity to lay new guidelines for charities associated with other football clubs. Other football clubs charities are nothing to do with that lot and I hope this incident does nothing to dent enthusiasm for our 1254125 campaign.
Last week, Rangers International chief exec Craig Mather, demanded to know why group of clubs were fined by the SFA following financial collapse, while Hearts and Dunfermline were not. Yesterday the SFA spelled out the considerable difference in scenarios, while informing us that Rangers (sic) actually asked for a financial penalty, presumably instead of a sporting penalty.
Yes, you heard right….. Duff and Phelps, who were appointed to recover creditors money, who attempted to sign new players during their tenure, asked for a financial penalty. Consistent with creditors interests and their considerable fee?
Mather is a ‘keeper’. I don’t know about you but I feel I am getting my £500k per year’s worth of entertainment out of him.
Congratulations (again) to STV’s Peter Smith on another excellent interview with Charles Green yesterday. It was Green’s “You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth” moment, as he appeared to suggest deviousness was a positive attribute.
There were more highlights than we have time to cover here. I am sure Walter Smith was delighted his private view that the current Rangers (sic) team are the worst in history (yes, I am aware of the short history).
Green did his best impersonation of a statue when Peter Smith mentioned the Dallas Cowboys but the former Rangers International chief exec was clear that despite the critical financial challenge ahead, he was not going to cancel pre-contract agreements with players due to join the club in September. That’s the thing about contracts, pre or otherwise, you can’t just cancel them unilaterally.
The eight players Rangers International have signed will join the club and there is nothing Green can do about it. Unless, they fail their medical…. Do you think Charles has been studying the Ricky Fulton book on Rangers management? This is how they used to do it down Ibrox way…….
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Ole
top 5
I wish I were more confident about tonight than I am.
Too many loose ends flying about with players gone and going and no adequate replacements.
bobby murdoch’s curled-up winklepickers
12:13 on 7 August, 2013
YORKBHOY
Widnae touch Suarez wi yours,tbh.
Poisonous individual,and almost certainly a division in the dressing room.
Liverpool will benefit from him going. I doubt the buyer will
where is everyone,logged on and read article
Seems like our complaints about the AC Milan game were fully investigated. And that the Rangers Charity Foundation was as badly run as we might have expected.
Regulator Rules Rangers Charity Foundation Breached Legal Duties
More nervous about this game than I should be but a solid defensive display and an early break away goal would do just fine.
Surely we wont change the Ambrose/Mulgrew centre half partnership from the weekend to include Wilson?
If the general consensus is that we score 1 goal and we’re through AND Samaras’ away record in Europe is like a goal head start…the surely there is nothing to worry about?
Celtic FC: Founded 1888 to raise funds for charity
‘rangers fc II’: Founded 2012 to steal funds from charity.
Tonight if we play to our best we will win
COYBIG
ALL the other stuff going onus concerning and hilarious but ultimately a sideshow until we secure our passage(hopefully) to the next round
IMHO
HX2
BRTH
Count me in with the away goals counting double.
I predict squeaky bum time tonight. We’ll lose an early goal but pummel them afterwards with Sammy getting a late equaliser.
Does anyone know much about Alfred Finnbogasson? Seems like a good match to replace Hooper (28 goals in the Dutch top division last season for Heerenveen) but is likely to cost upwards of £4m.
Money worth spending?
If I ran a charity night then diverted most of the profit away from the cause I would have questions to answer from the Police,why is this not happening?
If we score first tonight I think we will go through If they score first It is up in the air.
BMCUW
Suarez not for me either even if we could afford him. I don’t see him fitting in at Arsenal if that’s where he ends up.
I’m disappointed by the OSCR result, they seem to have supported the club rather than the charity.
I wonder if we’ll hear from the orcs like we did when the first ASA result was announced
fourgreenfields
12:10 on 7 August, 2013
bobby murdoch’s curled-up winklepickers
There was a big turnout at the last day oot you organised , are you going for a world record turnout this time .
Ally Stakebake demands to know :-)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Not really-the pub might run out of beer!
To be honest,FOURGREENFIELDS,I think everyone enjoyed the last one,people now stop to say hello to those they may have previously passed by.
I know that sounds sanctimonious.
I’ll happily settle for that again. With as many happy Tims as possible.
Sevcomedian has TFPLG up there with the best:
“Everybody seems to be sniping at Ally but his win ratio is better than Sir Alex Ferguson and a few previous managers too”
gordybhoy64 ACGR
ref Ardbeg chat last night … It a whisky dear to my heart having been involved in taking it back out of mothballs for a cost close to that paid for CFC by Fergus. (The 2 buys of the last century for sure)
If you like Ardbeg then you must get a hold of one of St Andrews Eden Brewery’s Islay Oak Aged Beers….THE best sipping whisky beer ever…..Pure Ardbeg smokey and soft fruit…and at 7.5abv plenty of alcohol…3 Ardbeg Casks used to produce approx. 2000 bottles.
Cant believe Barca are reported to have bid £35million for David Luiz,
he is a bigger bombscare than our Efe,speaking of the bold Efe,was it not him breaking out of defence that led to our winner on saturday
Just heard Tosh McKinley on Talk spurt saying Wilson is away for £2.5M!!
Has this actually happened or is he on something?
HH
/Bishop B
Just imagine what it would be like to be a supporter of the former rangers if we win tonight and set up a 2 qualifier play off with Maribor….as they trot out to unfurl the Division 3 flag (the last one ever….do they get to keep it ?) with so much uncertainty surrounding them taking on the might Brechin City…
I really have to keep pinching myself….
Sunderland have accepted a bid from Wigan Athletic for former Derry City winger James McClean.
That’s another one off The List.
HH
/Bishop B
Meanwhile Paddy McCourt is being linked to a move to the USA with LA Galaxy, along with San Jose Earthquakes and Portland Timbers all monitoring the winger’s situation.
All the be to the Derry Pele if it comes off!
HH
/Biship B
Kelvin must be really homesick if he is prepared to return to his previous club, and the manager who refused to sanction his move to CFC in January and who froze him out of the first team for the rest of the season.
Not to mention giving up the chance to play in the CL, but seemingly quite happy to ply his trade in the English second tier.
It’s a strange one.
HH!!
Feeling slightly nervous about tonights game after last weeks performance even although I believe that we should beat Elfsborg with ease.
Should .. but the fact remains, last weeks and the weekends games clearly demonstrated that we desperately need a quality proven striker.
Was surprised that Balde wasn’t given some game time on Saturday ahead of tonight.
Wasn’t exactly impressed with him in the pre-season games, but the guy looks massive and with the amount of cross balls we were putting in with nobody to recieve them then he would have had plenty of chances.
At the other end Wilson is a liability and I’ll be glad to see him go, What was that back heel in front of goal about last week? Wouldn’t happen in schoolboy football and a better team would have punished this.
If we can’t beat Elfsborg, fact its we don’t deserve to be in the CL.
Can anybody claify why we let Hooper go before we successfully negotiated the group stages? Surely we could have agreed the transfer but delayed the date as necessary?
As for the other mob, comedy gold, they are reaping what they have sown. Just hope admin 2 comes before the end of the season and the fail to be promoted.
C’mon the hoops. A 2-0 win will do for me.
Burnley78,
had a look at the website,seems like the stockists are all in Fife,is there someone stocking them in the Glasgow area
Lawrenzo,
regarding Hooper you wont get many teams agreeing to buy a player and then letting him play for current team,obvious reason being possibility of injury
Any of you guys out there played golf at Archerfield?
Morning bhoys, quietly confident we’ll get the job done tonight but an early goal wouldn’t half calm my nerves. I’m looking for some info, a few mates very kindly gave me a champions league strip with Barca 21 on the back signed by Big Vic and Tony Watt for my 40th last week, I know I know I don’t look a day over 39! Any way i’m going to get that bad boy framed and have procured some nice snaps of Vic and Tony scoring on the night, what I would love is a copy of the tifo panorama for the frame also, but i can’t seem to find it anywhere on the net. The club do the big framed ones which I have but not smaller individual pics, i’ve contacted the Greek lad who does our games but he doesn’t have the panorama and scottish media pix has a version which is taken from off center in the main stand. Does anyone have a decent copy or know where i can get a copy of the picture to use in my frame. Any advice would be appreciated. HH
Afternoon, getting nervous about tonight, although they offered little last week we only have a slender lead and have questions on our central defence. Presume they will push Keane up top with BangBang , he was the guy (no 14) who spent the night kicking Sammi on right mid position. We will need a central pair to be strong and up for 90 mins of hard physical challenges. So big choice for Neil on Wilson , Ambrose or Mulgrew If we succeed there hopefully we can go on and win the tie.
fingerscrossedcsc
maleys bhoy,
naw :-))
Afternoon folks,
Bit nervous about tonight. However if we score I think we will go through. Would feel happier if Efe is not at centre back as I feel he is an accident waiting to happen. Especially as we no longer have big Vic as midfield protector of the defence and I think more questions will be asked of our defence tonight than last week.
However that apart I think we can damage them on the break, could be a game for Forrest to shine with his pace if he gets enough quality possession.
Think Lenny should keep it tight in midfield to try to protect the defence and then hit on the break when the opportunity arrives.
Good luck to the lads tonight.
HH Dan
Really looking forward to the game tonight…….hope Wilson is playing
This has probably been posted already but the following is how TFPLG described Craig Mather in a BBC interview:
“He’s the chief executive of the football club and as I’ve said all along, I think the chief executive and the manager is arguably the biggest working relationship at the club.”
‘The club’ – who is the Chief Exec of the PLC or holding company then?
S
bobby murdoch’s curled-up winklepickers
Looking forward to it mate , had a great time at the last one .
HH
Brogan Rogan Trevino and Hogan supports Kano 1000
10:25 on
7 August, 2013
I can’t be anything other than grateful that people like yourself keep banging the drum about such issues and I’m certainly in for the Battered Bunnet donating double for away goals version but ( you knew one was coming :>) ) where we differ is the assertion that the NHS?Government should be funding treatment.My question would be at who else’s cost?
For me that’s where people in this country need real leadership and direction from our politicians with real honesty and transparency at the forefront of shaping policy. We need to have a real grown up debate about where and how our money is spent and a subsequent facing up to reality by the consumer viz. us. Why are we not being giving a real breakdown of the cost to each of us of treatment meted out on the National Health and more importantly an input as to where we spend funds. It is only too easy to spend without thought but if say we could reduce the situation to simple terms e.g. we have £20 000 in our kitty with which we can provide treatment for neuroblastoma, a course of IV treatment for those unable to conceive a liver transplant or etc etc – you choose where the money should be spent it might lead to more rational and accepted if not acceptable outcomes for us all.
That’s my 5p’s worth. Apologies for the negativity with regard to your efforts which I truly respect and support but those who know me will know that I have long held the view that this a debate that needs to be held. Whilst politicians need votes of course it will never happen.
Where’s the nearest boozer tae Block 409 ?
Lough Sheelin CSC, MLost