I don’t like playing games when players have transfer or contract business swirling around the dressing room. Give a team an excuse to underperform and they tend to grab it, so I expect a difficult challenge at Easter Road tomorrow. If we want to maintain our unbeaten run and two month old clean sheet record we’ll need to bring our A game.
Neil Lennon’s comments at yesterday’s media conference, about potentially dropping players who plan to leave in the summer, point in this direction. Few manage to perform with an eye on their next gig.
Well done to the new regime at Newco Rangers who used Latin in their stock market announcement yesterday. There was no “ex-gratia” payment to resigning director, Brian Stockbridge, who instead had his contract paid up.
Paying Stockbridge in full is hardly a money saver but with him not around it will sweeten the medicine others will have to take and allow a fresh angle to be pitched to supporters at season ticket renewal time. Let’s hope their manager sticks to his contractual guns.
Daily Record columnist, Chris Sutton, has today made the case for Neil Lennon to leave Celtic and move to England. Nice one, Chris. If you hand around long enough to get to see it all.
[calameo code=000390171bffb0dd3dc4f lang=en page=128 hidelinks=1 width=100% height=500]
845 Comments- Pages:
- «
- 1
- ...
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
- 21
- 22
- 23
- »
Bobby
Ye were not far away bud. Blanket finish. Heavily gambled too.
PF
3/1 1st goal. Skimpy, but understandable!
TWISTS
Most if it was mine!
Twisty
I remember Larsson first goal paying for trip to Seville …had him on quite a few of the cup games …inc the Boavista game with a 1-0 correct score double
I’ve lifted a few decent first goal scorers this season ..VVD twice , Lustig , Mulgrew and Kris on a number of occasions
Transferring some of that to the gee gees would be welcome
Top of the morning to you all from a dull, miserable, Fife.
Good report from the Celtic Trust who must be THE conduit for interaction between board and all fans.
Good article on anti-Irish racism in Scotland http://gu.com/p/3m6j2/tw
Twisty/ BMCUWP
Think Fulham are big odds today ,7/4 against a div 1 outfit
I know that Sheffield Utd did Villa last time out …but Villa weren’t giving a toss
I would much rather we played decent football on a regular basis and give some of our young players games than go unbeaten.
2-1 win today with Ambrose scoring first.
Bobby
Another day another dollar…………………..gone:-)
PF
Will have a look. Only backed on the hoops match so far. Virgil and Charlie and 2 0 and 3 0.
PF AYR
I have a few friends who support Fulham.
It would be unfair to jinx them!
Big nan
Excellent balanced article by McKenna ……he has been good reading of late
TWISTS
Win and f/c in 300 Chelt. Was well up at that stage. Should have chucked it there and then.
Four bets,four seconds,about a length in total. That’s not effin fair.
It’s a big boys game,but I could have bloody wept!
Griffiths or May??
I’d choose Tony Watt.
Walgreen 8.39
Agreed! The record might keep players and manager motivated, but the there’s never been a better time to give some of the up and comings the chance to show what they can do.
Good Morning Timland.
Manky morning out there,if it’s the same in Leith the
game could be in danger.
Big Nan
08:34 on
26 January, 2014
Top of the morning to you all from a dull, miserable, Fife.
Good report from the Celtic Trust who must be THE conduit for interaction between board and all fans.
————————————————
“all fans”
Not this one.
Mate.
How can you possibly miss the bleeding obvious?
The Celtic ” trust ” are the Masons of the Celtic support.
So Tony Watt scored two goals yesterday?
His talent has never been in doubt, but there have been concerns regarding his dedication and professionalism.
Hopefully when he returns, the season spent at Lierse will have been time well spent.
Still have very high hopes for the Bhoy. He’s a natural.
Any links to his goals yesterday?
HH!!
Getting ready for the game anybody from Edinburgh give the weather report ? Need to leave at 10 HH
Tallybhoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcGgrgzMb3I&feature=youtu.be
Anybody watching SSN there haha what was the weather all about yesterday HH
Morning all. Another dreadful day weather-wise down here. Wind and rain. Seems unending.
Hope the game goes ahead.
Hun penalty was given for pulling in the box….they seem to get an inordinately high number of awards for this
Especially given that many similar such claims from other teams are largely ignored
“all fans”
Not this one.
Mate.
How can you possibly miss the bleeding obvious?
The Celtic ” trust ” are the Masons of the Celtic support.
………………………
Mcjay1 File under p for pish!
It’s dull, wet, pelting down rain, windy, if it’s like this in old reekie ? I doubt there will be a game on today.
And unlike some in here I was looking forward to our undefeated record continuing, lurking Huns GIRUYs.
Good morning friends from a very very wet and very very windy grey and unpleasant looking East Kilbride. If it’s anything like this in the Far East it will be a day for keeping the high balls low.
2-nil to the good guys.
Big Nan
09:17 on
26 January, 2014
“all fans”
Not this one.
Mate.
How can you possibly miss the bleeding obvious?
The Celtic ” trust ” are the Masons of the Celtic support.
………………………
Mcjay1 File under p for pish!
——————————————————————–
Forgive me, Nan.
I mistook you for a serious thinker.
Kayal
Couple of excellent goals by Watt …particularly the second one
In the last few games he’s managed as many goals as our entire forward have since Sept ( a slight exaggeration ..perhaps ..:-))))
A few people seemed to enjoy the Not The View memories posted yesterday. Here’s some more, picking up after the signing of Willie Falconer…….
If you have a sofa – hide behind it now, because here comes season 93-94. The year of bucket seats in the Jungle, Lou Macari and, of course, Wayne ‘Bertie’ Biggins. And if those three haven’t got you reaching for the pills then read on…
On the Friday February 25th the board called a press conference. This was to be a dramatic announcement. Cambuslang was a reality. David Smith, Patrick Nally and Kevin Kelly faced the media to deliver one of the most astonishing addresses ever given to the Scottish football press. In a pronouncement to match the ‘Unsinkable’ tag applied to Titanic, Smith told an incredulous press pack that the funding for Cambuslang was in place thanks to a London-based company called Gefinor. There was to be a share issue which would finally allow fans to buy shares. The board, we were being led to believe, had come through against all the odds and these plans for our Brave New Celtic World would be ratified at an EGM.
Smith’s posture during all this was something to behold – sitting with his arms folded as tight as they could get, his delivery was determined to the point of contemptuous. Patrick Nally was his usual bombastic self while Kevin Kelly, meanwhile, sat with the best ‘I’m a very powerful business man’ look that he could muster.
Everyone knew it was a complete fairy story. Worse yet, it took about an hour to prove it. Gefinor were contacted. They denied all knowledge of finding money to give to the Celtic board. Superstadia, the company who were to design the new stadium, knew nothing about it, although they were adamant that they would be building it. Their high powered, moving and shaking offices looked like some kind of dodgy taxi rank. The whole plan was ridiculed on the evening news programmes. It was to be the last misjudgement of the Kelly/White/Grant regime.
The following Tuesday Gefinor officially stated that they had nothing to do with the Celtic plans. They had held talks with Stadivarious, but nothing was agreed, or signed. An executive for the bank said that they were, ‘Shocked by the announcement of a deal’. It was all going seriously wrong for the board now.
Wednesday March 2nd was one of the strangest days Celtic Park has ever seen. The Celts for Change pressure group had declared an official boycott of the game. They were pretty confident that fewer than 10,000 people would attend. The board disagreed. Celts for Change stationed someone at every turnstile; they would compile their own attendance figure. When released the figures would differ by 2,000. But by then attendance figures were the last thing on the mind of the board members. The Bank of Scotland had received a request for payment from Middlesborough. They wanted the money they were owed for Willie Falconer. The bank refused.
They contacted the board demanding an immediate meeting regarding the level of debt at the club. In attendance for the board were Kevin Kelly, Tom Grant, James Farrell and Jack McGinn. The Bank put the club’s financial position to the assembled directors. They sat in stunned silence. What the bank was telling them bore little resemblance to what they had been told by David Smith. Basically the bank was ready to call in the receivers. Michael Kelly later said he thought this was a bluff by the bank!
Immediately after the meeting the bank released a statement saying that the club was in, ‘Immediate and dire peril of being put into receivership.’ An indication of how badly the club had been managed was the value of Celtic’s net assets – one sixtieth of Rangers’ value; even Thistle were valued at four times Celtic’s worth!
Kevin Kelly called for the resignations of David Smith, and Chris White on the basis that they had misled the board regarding the financial situation. He announced that the club had entered negotiations with Brain Dempsey and Fergus McCann over the future of the club.
A TV crew found David Smith at Glasgow airport; he was on his way to Celtic Park, and still trying to talk his way out of it. Things had been fine, he maintained, until the first 10 minutes of the New Year Old Firm game and the cup defeat by Motherwell.
Smith and Chris White departed, selling their shares to McCann for a tidy sum, and Michael Kelly seethed off into the distance. Having sold his shares as well he was under the impression his cousin Kevin would sell too, and was deeply unhappy at Kevin’s decision to stay. Mind you, we were all a bit gutted that Kev was still there.
Michael Kelly would later describe the removal of the old board as, ‘The dirty campaign, conceived in vengeance, born in deceit.’ That may well have been the case, but the fact was that the family dynasty that had controlled the club for nearly a century had constituted nothing more than a gravy train for those lucky enough to be part of it. The members of those families considered the money that people like you and I paid to see Celtic to be their money. Anyone who dared try and ask for more was cast out, branded as greedy, unworthy of the Celtic jersey. And the worst part of it was that for too many years than we’d like to mention we all believed it. They fed us a mountain of garbage about the honour of wearing the jersey being worth more than money, and it was swallowed whole. Players like Dalglish and Nicholas were pilloried because they knew their worth and weren’t prepared to let themselves be short changed so that the directors could eat in the best places, and live in best houses on the strength of the talent of others
. The situation was summed up in the leader article of NTV 48; ‘All we are left to do is regret the lost opportunities, the lost five years, the hundreds and thousands of pounds that could have been invested in the club instead of being wasted if these tiny, frightened men had, just once, put Celtic first.’
Five years? Try ninety.
By the end of Friday the 4th of March Celtic had a new team at the helm. The car park at Celtic Park was filled with jubilant fans, one of them yelling at the top of his voice the newspaper headline for the day – McCann’s the Man!
The Bunnet had dunnit. Fergus McCann was the CEO, Dominic Keane was a director, Michael MacDonald (stepson of Gerald Weisfeld) was also now a director. Curiously, the man who had been at the forefront of the whole thing, Brian Dempsey, was not. He claimed to have no interest in returning to the Celtic Board, although he would be investing a substantial sum in the club. However this money never appeared, and Dempsey’s relationship with McCann quickly soured. There are many rumours why this happened, most of them libellous. Suffice to say that McCann decided not to move the club from Parkhead, and Brian Dempsey’s land in the Robroyston area remained undeveloped.
The next day the team took to the field at McDairmid Park. It was only seventeen weeks since our last visit there, but in that time we’d gone through four managers and two boards. The ground was packed out with jubilant Celtic fans with many more watching from vantage points outside the ground. To signal a real change the team actually won an away fixture. Paul Byrne scored the first goal of the new era in the first minute, and that was enough to win the game.
We followed that with a 0:0 at Easter Road, noteworthy only for the first appearance as a substitute of a youngster called Simon Donnelly.
In between those fixtures we saw the departure from Celtic Park of the man, the myth, the legend that was Wayne Biggins. Having scored the grand total of zero goals for the team, Macari somehow managed to convince Joe Jordan to part with a sum of money for this most worthless of players.
The first home game under McCann saw Celtic Park hold its biggest non-Old Firm crowd for several years. Over 36,000 turned up to give the Bunnet an indication of what kind of support Celtic could get. Unfortunately the team gave a performance that underlined why some of those 36,000 had been staying away in the first place. A truly terrible performance ended with a 1:0 defeat.
Our next home game, a 2:1 win against Raith (Donnelly scoring both) was four days later, was played in front of 20,000 fewer spectators. Clearly it would take more than a better looking balance sheet to get people back through the Celtic Park turnstiles.
Jobo
I hate when the weather is so bad it becomes a bit of a leveller. High winds make it farcical. Big Fra will do well to keep another clean sheet in freak conditions.
Tom Rogic came on for the second half for Melbourne Victory as they copped a 5-0 drubbing from a Del Piero inspired Sydney F.C.
Tom apparently played well,in spite of the score.
I see the Celtic Trust boys are up early and getting there digs in saying they speak for us all, let it be noted, NOT THIS BHOY,
Wee bit more
If you have a sofa – hide behind it now, because here comes season 93-94. The year of bucket seats in the Jungle, Lou Macari and, of course, Wayne ‘Bertie’ Biggins. And if those three haven’t got you reaching for the pills then read on…
Attention now focused, at last, on what was happening on the pitch. Things were bad. Scarily bad. Out of both cups, and fifth in the league. Our top scorers were Charlie Nicholas and Pat McGinlay -and neither of them had yet hit double figures.
It was hard to blame the manager. He had been working under extremely difficult conditions. On the other hand it was hard to praise the manager either. His ‘style’ of football was characterised by many supporters as agricultural – and these were the sympathetic ones. Optimism was not high that we could reach third spot and qualify for Europe.
Naturally, this being Celtic, not everyone was fully focused on the team. The press were still sniffing around for excuses to wheel out the image of the club crest with a big crack down it and the favourite story of the time was that Fergus was refusing Macari cash to buy players. Given the manager’s track record there were those among us who felt that was no bad thing.
The funniest story involved Gary Gillespie denying that he was getting six grand a week basic, for doing hee-haw. Apparently Gary felt that this ‘could turn the Celtic fans against me.’
Possibly the most astonishing interview given at this time was one that Brian Dempsey gave to the Celtic View in which he not only announced the he was ‘fully behind Fergus McCann’s plans,’ but also stated that ‘It would be unrealistic to expect that a club could be turned around overnight… it is a five year job’. Hmm, watch this space for further sound bites from this man.
The race for Europe started at Tannadice, and a surprisingly competent 3:1 victory. Highlights were Willie Falconer scoring his first goal for the club, and Tony Mowbray getting a goal the day before he was due to get married. Mogga’s wedding was another of the big stories of the day. His bride Bernadette had been diagnosed with cancer and was only given months to live. It was not uncommon for the team bus to pick up the big man from the hospital on the way to matches.
The boost from the Tannadice win was followed by a typically terrible run that put paid to any thoughts of Europe. Home leads against Dundee (1:0) and Hearts (2:0) were squandered as both games ended in draws. The Hearts game was particularly hard to take, given that Le Merde was in their line up, although mercifully he didn’t score.
Following that there was a disastrous trip to Rugby Park for a 2:0 defeat (Pat McGinaly was sent off into the bargain) and Europe was all but gone. Following a home win against St. Johnstone (the Perth side and Raith Rovers were the only two sides who lost both their visits to Fortress Parkhead) we were to visit Ibrox . Well, some of us were. Celtic fans were actually banned from Ibrox by David Murray and for the first time in 102 years the Old Firm game would be watched by only one set of fans. The cause of this exclusion was an apparently unpaid bill of £7,000 from our last visit in October for alleged damage to the stadium. The club were refusing to pay the bill on the grounds that the police hadn’t reported any acts of vandalism from the Broomloan stand during that game. So where did this damage come from? Celtic felt they were being asked to give away money for nothing. Under the league rules there was no requirement to provide space for away supporters. It was at the home side’s discretion to allow them in. Interestingly, this loophole was going to be closed in the close season, so it was Murray’s last chance to pull this one. Celtic offered to put certain safeguards in place: tickets would only be sold to individuals who provided their home address; a cover charge of £1 would be levied per ticket to cover any repairs; Celtic would provide and pay for stewards for the Broomloan; independent inspections of the stand would occur before and after the game to assess any damage; Celtic would pay for all and any damage done during the course of the game with any funds left over being donated to charity; action would be taken against any individual found to have damaged the stadium. It all sounded pretty reasonable. But Rangers said no.
Given that they were going for a second consecutive treble, and were miles ahead of us in the league, and could in fact clinch the league if they won the game, a cynic might suggest that they wanted to really unnerve us, give us an almighty hammering, and win the league in front of a completely hun audience. Lions and the Christians, appeared to be what they had in mind (but go easy on the references to ancient Rome).
Our team line up suggested that we were certainly on a damage limitation exercise. A five man defence said it all. In midfield Collins was the main man – McStay had played his last game of the season, he was out with a hernia – while up front Simon Donnelly and Paul Byrne would just have to do their best. Prior to the game two plucky Celts flew over the stadium in a light plane trailing a banner reading ‘Hail hail the Celts are here’. My how the bears laughed.
The first half didn’t quite go as the huns might have hoped. With five at the back we were unusually tight, and up front Donnelly was giving Gough a surprisingly torrid time. Indeed it was this battle which brought the breakthrough. Gough fouled Donnelly on the edge of the box with half an hour gone. Collins stepped up, wearing his new boots – the Predator, the latest thing, which could, apparently, allow for better control, and provide more bend on the ball. And Collins duly proved that the advertising was not all bullshit as he curled an incredible shot over the wall and into the top corner. It was the first goal in competitive professional football to be scored with the Predator boot and Ibrox was outraged. The press reported that the goal was greeted with silence. Rubbish. The huns were going ballistic. To paraphrase David Bennie, it sounded like 44,000 vampires trapped inside St.Peter’s Square at daybreak – with the Pope hosing them down with holy water.
Although Rangers eventually drew level, thanks to an outrageously deflected shot, we had definitely won a moral victory.
The remainder of the season consisted of two 1:1 draws. The first was notable as the last game ever played at the old Celtic Park while the latter was utterly forgettable. We failed to qualify for Europe for the second season running, but unlike the previous year there was to be no early Christmas present from the European governing body in the shape of a parachute into the UEFA Cup because of a civil war.
Happily the huns were foiled in their bid for consecutive trebles by Dundee United in the cup final. Yes folks, in the dark days of the Nineties these were our crumbs of comfort.
The season finished with Frank McAvennie and Pat Bonner released, and a young Irish goalie called Shay Given being allowed to leave because Macari felt he was too small to be a top class ‘keeper.
We finished our season with a 3:1 win in a friendly against English double winners Manchester United. Simon Donnelly scored twice, and Chic Charnley was a guest player in the Celtic side. That same night Fergus McCann bumped into a flame-haired former Celtic midfield player who was in charge of another Scottish Premier Division side. He was considered the next great thing in club management, and you’ll never guess what happened next…
Stevie May = Stephen Fletcher.. The next one that got away if we don’t sign him.
A utterly shameful article from Richard Wilson in The Sunday Herald …..toadying , obsequious nonsense
First team wages are 30% of turnover ……apparently
Why on earth are they losing £1m per month ( or between £500k and £1m he slithers)then , given that that percentage ratio is much sought after ..
MSM at its oleaginous best
And one more….. Wish I had kept all my back issues now…!
don’t look back in anger celtic in the 90s
season 94-95: part 1
Rebuilding was the key word around Celtic Park in the summer of 1994. The structure of the team and the stadium were both in need of serious renovation. Fergus McCann had never been a great supporter of the idea to relocate from Celtic Park, so it was no surprise when he announced the decision to stay put and build an all-new, singing and dancing Paradise.
The decision to stay would, of course, mean that all the recent ‘improvements’ would be ripped out. Which basically meant that rather than bolt green bucket seats to the terraces the Whites and Kellys might as well have built a pile of money and set fire to it. The new seats that had been installed in the Jungle were reused in the main stand as the terraced area of Celtic Park – in other words 75% of the stadium – was razed to the ground. Given that the pitch would be destroyed by the equipment required to build the new stadium it was torn up as well and sold for £5 a piece, raising £15,000 for charity in the process. This figure was probably more than the old regime had raised in five years.
Not everyone was thrilled with the decision to remain in the East End, though. Brian Dempsey, who had played a key PR role in the removal of the Old Guard, broke off his ties with the new board. He felt that the decision to remain in Parkhead was ‘taking the club in the wrong direction.’ From then on he became a frequent and vociferous critic of almost every move McCann made.
Despite the speed with which reconstruction would take place we would still miss the deadline for the implementation of the Taylor Report, commissioned after the Hillsborough tragedy. It stated that all Premier League grounds should be all-seated by August 1994. Clearly we weren’t going to make that. So McCann struck a deal with the SFA for the use of Hampden for the season which cost the club a cool £500,000.
Incredibly some looked at this arrangement and concluded that Celtic were receiving preferential treatment from the SFA. Their gas was put a peep when reminded of how Rangers had also used Hampden when they were rebuilding Ibrox (even getting an Old Firm game postponed in the middle of an Ibrox injury crisis because of Hampden had… ahem… ‘frost bound terracing’!).
On the team front the manager had begun the process of rebuilding. McAvennie, Gillespie, Bonner, Nicholas and Wdowcyzk were all released. The only one who could really question the decision was Bonner. He was still good enough to be the Republic of Ireland’s number 1 keeper, and would play in the that summer’s World Cup finals.
To replace some of these players Macari followed up a recommendation he had received from Pat Crerand, who had been impressed by a couple of lads he’d seen in an army cup final in Moenchengladbach. Justin Whittle and Gary Holt were invited to join the squad as trialists for a trip to Canada, and were subsequently given contracts.
But the big transfer story had been the move to bring back former hero Andy Walker. Walker had left Celtic for Bolton three years earlier. During his time there he and John McGinlay had struck up a partnership that had put the likes of Liverpool and Arsenal to the sword in the FA cup. His return was most welcome, not least as it turned out to be Macari’s last act as Celtic manager. The next day he was fired, apparently by phone, just as he was going on holiday.
No one, except maybe Lou himself, was too upset. Rumours had been flying around for months that he had lost the dressing room, that he was never there, and that he did not get along with McCann (possibly a result of his public backing of the old regime). On the other hand, McCann’s insistence on calling his manager ‘Luigi’ did seem like a deliberate wind-up.
Typically Macari decided to sue for breach of contract. Equally typically it turned out he’d backed the wrong horse … again.
McCann counter-sued. Lou Macari was the first to find out that under no circumstances do you attempt to cross the Bunnet.
The choice of Tommy Burns to replace Macari was no surprise. He had taken Kilmarnock from second division to Premier League respectability, and the Scottish Cup semi-final. He was considered the next big thing in management. While most supporters seemed content with the appointment, some remained unconvinced. It’s one thing to make Killie into a team capable of playing in the Premier league – it’s another to take Celtic to the top.
But the bottom line was that we hadn’t really been spoilt for choice. Approaches had been made to a variety of established managers, amongst them Bobby Robson, but the only other realistic possibility had been Frank Connor. Celtic’s resident Ian Paisley lookalike had taken charge after Brady and Jordan cleared their desks, and he’d done more than a decent job, beating Dundee, Sporting Lisbon and Rangers, while coaxing much improved performances from McStay. The players were keen, at that time, for him to be appointed as the manager.
But Connor wasn’t a big name, or a returning hero. Burns’ appointment understandably sparked a furious reaction from Kilmarnock. They were of the opinion that Burns had been tapped and intended to see us burn at the stake for this heinous crime. Of course the media were right behind them, just as they’d told Dundee United to shut it the previous season when they complained of Rangers tapping Duncan Ferguson. The League investigated and surprised no one when they landed us with a record fine from the Scottish Football League (£100,000) for a ‘blatant breach of rules’. Celtic appealed pointing out that this amount was twenty times higher than the previous record fine, and citing Rangers’ fine of £5,000 for their approach to Ferguson the previous summer. No reasonable explanation was ever given and the appeal was rejected. It’s enough to make you paranoid.
As the season drew closer Celtic began bombarding the fans with flyers for season tickets at Hampden. The club tried to make this sound exciting ‘Be part of Celtic’s Hampden Year!’. 17,000 hardy souls decided they would be.
Little did they know that the ‘Hampden Year’ would become synonymous with bad football and missed opportunities.
Weather in auld reekie this morning. Says…..raining, winds 7 mph, hmmmmmm.
Kayal33
Thanks for that.
Young Tony doing what he does best – playing through the middle and sticking the ball in the net, instead of being stuck out wide a la Sammi!
Griffiths?
No thanks, give me Tony any time!
HH!!
Good to see Tony Watt scoring goals. I hope he has a fine second half to the season and returns home in the summer ready to push his way into our first teem.
For today I’m thinking that Pukki in for Stokes will be the only change,
Gordon_J backing Neil Lennon
09:54 on 26 January, 2014
Forrest injured again so Samaras will probably be in for him.