We’re in the last week of November and one point separates Celtic, Inverness and Dundee United at the top of the table, with Hamilton a point behind. Dundee, who put on a credible performance yesterday, sit alongside seventh placed Kilmarnock, nine points of the pace. That’s more than half the league within nine points of the top.
Remember the day Accies relegated Hibs, and we were told how the Championship would be vastly more competitive than the Premiership this season? There’s a nine point gap at the top of the Championship, which is the least competitive senior league in Britain.
If you were an investor in a Championship team located anywhere outside Gorgie, you might be running the numbers this morning on what another season of lower league football is going to cost to fund. With ever-diminishing income I know one club who could need £30m investment to get them through another 18 months of Championship football.
The chances of than kind of money materialising are zero, no matter if they flog their properties. There will also be a structural deficit, even with Premiership football, of having a massive infrastructure to support, without European revenue, of around £10m per season.
If you are a football club in Scotland with a large infrastructure to operate, maintain, police and insure, you need significant and regular European income. The cost of funding the job to overcome domestic and European competition (all of the latter would be seeded), runs into many tens of millions.
No one has even pretended they have a viable plan to overcome such obstacles. Hope you can find the fun in financial fundamentals.
Thanks for the feedback on Caesar & the Assassin, which is available here on CQNBookstore, but… if you go here, for an extra £1.01 you can get the book and a DVD (from Cesar (sic.), 6-2 game, Road to Seville, Birthday Bhoys Beating Barca).
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Iain Anderson song quiz.
Struck by the sounds before the sun. I knew night was gone.
Who wrote and sang it??
JUDE
Dylan.
Not on any studio albums but on his Biograph.
67th heaven
Snakes and fuds … belter
bhoys n ghirls
Im doing Movember for Downs & Proud this year so if anyone fancies donating to me please do so at the following link :-)
https://www.justgiving.com/Tommy-Melly/
Cheers for reading (and hopefully a wee donation)
HH
Timgreen,
Just poppin in to say that is heartwarming – restores your faith in humanity
BRTH, your mission, should you choose to accept it as CQN’s seanchaí (I’ve just appointed ye) is to tell this story in yer own incomparable manner.
Magic
timgreen
Rayo would be my favourite team in Spain for their beliefs, Barca for their football.
RV have done incredibly well over the past few seasons, virtually having to start from scratch each season, with bosmans and loans, but in the face of it all they have survived in La Liga.
They have a quality youth system as well, they manage to sell a few each season to keep the lights on, they get feck all help from the state, unlike their near neighbours who are as subsidised as it gets.
Their support is amazing, as working class as it gets, true supporters, and not a hint of glory seekers.
HH
The Celtic youth set up is funded primarily through the assorted pools and lotteries we run, and on the other hand by the training compensation paid by other clubs for the many players we develop who don’t make the grade.
Additionally, although regrettably infrequently, it provides a player for the first team, James Forrest being the most recent example of such.
This latter group deliver benefits from two perspectives: The contribution to the first team on the one hand; and a transfer fee subsequently.
Lenny’s rebuilding was financed entirely by Aiden McGeady’s transfer. Previously the likes of Beattie, Maloney and Marshall funded wee Gordon’s rebuild.
Fact is, is we close down the youth development operation we lose the revenue delivered by the lotteries and the training compo, and the (infrequent) first team impact it delivers.
Point being, for Celtic, youth development is a cash positive business centre that occasionally produces a first team player.
Closing it down makes no sense at all. It also implies waking away from our responsibility to the wider game in Scotland.
It can be improved of course, and I gather there’s a fair bit of pressure in that regard, but it’s a central part of a professional club’s operation, and an obligation to the game at large.
Rayo Vallecano mes que un club.
BMCW
Ta.
soukous
>}
HH
And they are
JUDE
Sorry I cant remember the name of the track. At work just now,but I’ll look up my copy of Biograph when I get home in the morning.
Sleep well Timland
Things to do and no time to do them.
Take care and god bless
HH
KTF
TBB – apologies meant to answer your post quicker.
Not for closing down the Youth set-up – would just like to see it being a bit more proactive even to the extent of ‘purchasing’ some at older teenage years in order to ‘fast-track’ a few players into the first team set-up.
As it stands (an analogy) – you buy raw ‘petit pois’ take them home and go through a protracted process; shell them, wash them, steep them – then parboil them. Use on the day or freeze them = cost, time, water and energy!
Or – purchase ready frozen (circa £1) = use on day or store in freezer?
Cooked and on the plate they taste the same!
CFC Development are big enough to operate ‘supermarket-type’ purchasing technique. Examine the timescale to produce a player (through our system) and supplement it with some ‘ready frozen’ (players that have been through other club’s ‘raw’ process). Time to look at making Lennoxtown more accountable – it should doing much more than ‘washing its face’ or producing a ‘fragile’ JF!
Eat-your-Greens-CFC!
Very impressed with Rayo Vallecano. Though we as fans do a lot I feel our board could have done more on the Living wage.
Looking forward to Thursday they have played very well since we last meet but a win is very possible. Not sure Zagreb will win in Astra either.
Night all Night wee Oscar. God bless x x
JQB
Now there is a challenge.
A little research, a little digging, and you never know what kind of story could unfold.
Hello…is there anybody in there?
Interesting points today about the whole set up and player development. Celtic FC is a total business so I don’t believe that the only objective of the Development Squad is to supply players to the “big” team. A lot of players are brought up and moved along…….money is made on them. A very few make it into the “big” team. Most top players are now purchased.
Unfortunate, but true. Even Man U and Barca are no longer bringing their own developed players through as much as before..
I long for the old days when the Kelly Babes ( mostly) won the Big Cup, thanks to big Jock.
For the younger supporters who never saw that team play live, believe me, they were truly fantastic. !
There will be another team like them some day. Keep the Faith.
westies
you got me recalling an old song – My memories of it, go something like this to the tune of mother Kelly’s doorstep…..
————————————-
On Robert Kelly’s sideboard
in the paradise stand
there sits a trophy – it’s the pride of the land
for he gave us the Kelly kids
he showed them how to play
He took them all to Lisbon on the 25th of May
Sir Robert – he gave us the Kelly kids
JUDE2005
No video footage that I can find,but I reckon this is the choon,live version,from 1963.
http://vimeo.com/88394333
Back to work,so I’ll leave this up for a listen.
From Nick Drake,died forty years ago today.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3sQv04CFSdE
SFA fine livi for tax evasion hoho they have brasser brass necks than Sevco. Hunbelievable. Ibronix. No wonder n . Britain voted . Jesus wept.
Good Morning Celts not a bad morning at all in Glasgow city centre very mild for November.That boy Xavi of Barcelona is a top bloke.
Underfoot wet.
Overhead dry.
All around you, dark.
MidWinterCSC
HH jamesgang
Good morning friends from an only damp, not too chilly, lightly breezed East Kilbride
glasshalffullCSC
Taurangabhoy Livi were dealt with by the SPFL not the SFA, different organisations. Hail Hail Hebcelt
Saw back page of Daily Rectum in shop as I collected my Mortons rolls….can this be true? The HunFA are applying rules? I must still be asleep, oh wait….it’s just for the normal clubs. The favourite sons will still be pandered to….plus ca change….
Jobo
You’ll be rid of the tash just before it starts icing up!
Laters Timdom
HH jamesgang
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30185423
SPFL chief executive Neil Doncaster said: “The tax default and reporting rules are an integral part of maintaining a fair league competition.”
Good morning CQNers,
The absurdity of Campbell Ogilvie being President of the SFA and learning of the punishment meted out to ICT is beyond parody.
Friesdorfer –
thank you kindly, sir. Or madam ;-)
Rayo Vallecano – outstanding. How do we arrange a pre-season friendly with them? If any group of players deserve to experience a bit of what Xavi was talking about it’s them.
quickdraw
07:20 on 25 November, 2014
What’s that, three quarters empty stadium and everyone but the green brigade sitting on their hands moaning about players and manager? Bet they canny wait.
quickdraw
07:20 on 25 November, 2014
Rayo Vallecano – outstanding. How do we arrange a pre-season friendly with them? If any group of players deserve to experience a bit of what Xavi was talking about it’s them.
——
Precisely!
HH jamesgang
GlassHalfEmptyGlassHalfFullCSC
HH jamesgang
Morning all. Shirley livi just use the “Bryson” defence. Games been played, canny change it.
Interesting spin from the RC ” sports” desk… Hearts player out for 3 months after challenge from miller, which “caused” the rangers (sic) player to receive a yellow card. Poor Kenny.
Ferguson, Missouri, eh?
And we have nutters on here proclaiming that Scotland is an institutionally prejudiced country? Well, we are clearly amateurs by comparison…
Morning all.
Dull down here so far. Quiet too.
I see Radio Scotland were earlier reporting that McHattie is out for 3 weeks because of Miller’s kick. They have conveniently overlooked it now, although they are still running the Naismith apologia, without mentioning the “l” word which let him move for nothing. How can London let them get away with peddling lies?