Scott Brown was not the only one was briefly worried about Neil Lennon’s position in recent months. Neil has never particularly hidden his desire to work in England one day but when it became evident that there would be a few seats available in the English top flight, with the Everton job in particular becoming available, I am sure there were a few nervous twitches.
As and when Neil decides he is going to move on, Celtic will want to have a plan for succession in place, if not entirely executed. In May, when Neil was fielding questions about moving on, I doubt any succession planning had taken place. Some at the club would have been looking forward to a summer break and some player trading. The prospect of finding a new manager, with all the inherent consequences for trading, preseason planning and Champions League qualification, would have caused mild panic.
Always be prepared.
How is your 1254125 work coming along? Not started yet? Today, Tom Conniffe completes his 125 mile walk along the Leeds-Liverpool canal. Go look and see how well his fundraising has gone (and get involved if you can).
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Auldheid
I’d love him in a court. Imagine the stories who could tell under oath.
.
A Prized asset that Celtic must Not accept anything but Top dollar fo.
Published on June 30th, 2013 by Andy Muirhead
It was inevitable that clubs would come sniffing round Victor Wanyama following the performances he has put in for Celtic domestically, but more importantly in the Champions League. I just find it somewhat baffling into why none of the top clubs in England have bid for the Kenyan midfielder.
His performances in the Champions League, specifically the games against Barcelona were top drawer and any team in the top half of the English Premier League would be itching to have someone like that in their side, going up against the likes of Messi, Iniesta and Xavi and not looking out-of-place.
With Southampton and Cardiff City the only clubs currently lodging bids for the 22-year-old, they could easily secure a sizeable fee when they sell him on after one or two good seasons in the lower echelons of the Premier League. That is where Wanyama would be playing if he signed for either of those two clubs and in my opinion a waste of his talents and potential.
Celtic are in a catch 22 situation here, they do not need to sell their prized assets, but with only one year left on his contract along with the player and his representatives vying for a move south to the riches of the Premier League, they do not want to lose him for nothing.
Regrettably Celtic are resigned to the fact that they will lose Wanyama this summer, but that should not dissuade them from holding out for as much as they can get for the combative midfielder.
After accepting a £12 million bid from Southampton, Celtic had to sit back and watch Wanyama reject the personal terms offered to him by the south coast English outfit. That started a chain of events which saw manager Neil Lennon and Wanyama’s agent Ivan Modia criticise one another over comments made in the press.
That is a side issue and in all honesty much of it is bluster from both sides as they try to get the best deal for club and player respectively.
Just two years ago Wanyama cost Celtic £900,000 from Belgian side Beerschot on a four-year deal and he hasn’t looked back since. His performances have seen his stature in the game rise significantly with many suitors keeping tabs on him including Liverpool, Arsenal and Manchester United. But it seems these ‘big teams’ are looking to the continent for their new signings rather than what can be best described as the bargain bucket of European football – the Scottish football league system.
For £12 million these clubs could secure a young midfielder with huge potential that could burst onto the scene this season. Manchester United, in my opinion, are desperate for a combative player in the middle of the park a type of player they have lacked since the departure of Roy Keane. Wanyama would certainly add a presence to the heart of any side in the EPL and proved a major factor in Celtic’s progression to the knock out stages of the Champions League.
If or should I say when Celtic sell Wanyama, to whatever club it may be, his sell on value – if he continues on his present form and betters it – will increase more just by playing in the EPL, a league which is overhyped and a lot of its players overpriced. So, Celtic must secure a sell on percentage for the Kenyan as they will not only secure what could be a Scottish football record sale, but also a significant chunk of what his next club would receive if or when they sold him on.
We know what Celtic’s asking price is for Wanyama after they accepted Southampton’s bid, but rejected Cardiff’s later bid of £10 million. Whether both sides battle it out for the midfielder’s signature is just one factor that will come into player over the next two months, but Celtic must look to the future – a future without their prized asset.
His sale would provide manager Neil Lennon with a transfer kitty that every Scottish football manager could only dream of and with two players already arriving at Parkhead in the guise of Amido Balde and Virgil van Dijk, strengthening of the side must continue if they are to challenge in Europe once more.
Wanyama’s loss will be felt there is no denying that, Celtic do not have a backup of similar ilk and to buy someone of similar form, stature and ready-made you will probably see much of the £12 million transfer fee disappear even before personal terms are discussed.
So where does that leave Celtic? Well all the cards for the time being are in their hand, although as the closure of the transfer window approaches on the 1st September, their hand could be well and truly forced. But they should not just accept a bid for the sake of it. Any new signings need to come in as early as possible, so as to use pre-season and the initial Champions League qualifiers against Northern Irish side Cliftonville to blood them in, before the hard work really begins.
No one player is bigger than a club and the same can be said for Wanyama and Celtic, but the club need to play it smart in their sale of the Kenyan otherwise the lasting effects of being toothless in negotiations could come back to bite them in the long run.
Summa
Auldheid:
Regards your link to the Ewing Grahame article, I thought Whyte did produce accounts but the auditors declined to sign off on them?
Summa
The author of the piece you posted contradicts himself.
He says Victor is entering the last year of his contract then goes on to say he was signed 2 years ago on a 4 year contract.
I blame the skoolz.
HH
Charlotte’s latest;
http://t.co/4wS2oJ0CIo
Ok Bhoys, and Ghirls – rise and shine, it’s July!!
And a fine sunny, dry start to July it is here in ole EK. A big month lies ahead.
Jobo
Jobo
Cheers but I can hardly see through my half shut eyes after staying up late to watch the match
Btw… a nice taxi driver put the ek weather forecast on late last night to save you the bother ;),
TBJ – as it’ll save me doing the Google thing, what was the score?
And as for the weather, it’s all very well these folk providing forecasts, or as I prefer to call it guessing. But I’d like to think that my REPORTING of the current live situation (sun still shining through broken clouds and only a gentle breeze) gives folk on here a better idea of whether it’s a day for flip flops rather than wellies.
Off to work….
Jobo
Brasil destroyed spain 3-0
Keep on keeping on with the weather reports….. I totally appreciate the ek weather fluctuations as I experience the micro climate of nerston every work day
Loving the zombie rage on RM
Apparently craigy boy is guilty of fraud when buying out oldco… which…. makes them the victims :))))
Demands for justice…. compensation. . Etc etc etc.
Good morning fellow Celts- nice morning in Renfrewshire
Weekend -sound of banging drums disrupting Sat and Sunday evening – dregs of society scuttling about, wummin in luminous orange jackets in one band and the other band had wummin in lime green jackets wtf! ?? Anyway, windaes shut and they disappeared like sunshine on a Scottish summer’s day…
I suppose they will be around next Saturday too before infesting Belfast
If we ignore them will they eventually go away?
Morning all.
Just catching up on last night’s posts – the ones about Irish-based Celtic fans were of great interest.
Three and a half years ago I flew to Dublin from Prestwick to catch a connecting flight back to Pisa – early Saturday morning, mid-January.
To my (very) pleasant surprise the airport was hoachin’ with Celtic fans of all ages and of both sexes – all sporting the colours. Celtic were at home to St Johnstone that afternoon and they were there to board flights to both Prestwick and Glasgow to go to the game.
Got into conversation with a group of bhoys – over a pint of Guiness for breakfast. They explained that a lot of pubs in the Dublin area would NOT show Celtic games, but EPL ones instead. In some pubs Celtic fans would be huddled in a wee corner watching on a tiny screen, while the big screen would be showing Wigan v Bolton!
I did not see one EPL top that day – and there was a full EPL fixture list that week-end.
Nobody seemed to be travelling to England – maybe they had all decided to watch a match in their local Dublin boozer instead!
Respect to the Irish-based Celts!
HH!!
Morning cqn
anyone know when the klans audited accs.were/are due ?h.h
Morning,
If only the hurting huns at The Herald would put as much dedication into investigating Sevco’s finances
THOMAS ROGNE will today sign for Wigan
Athletic as a free agent and the npower
Championship club will complete the move
without having to pay a training compensation
fee to Celtic.
It had been expected the Scottish champions
were in line to receive £179,620 as they had
offered Rogne a new contract. However, that
compensation rule only applies until a player
reaches the age of 23 and since the Norwegian
turned that age on Saturday – the day before
his Parkhead deal expired – Celtic are no
longer entitled to remuneration.
Classic Media House diversionary non story in the Record today (‘look over there, it’s a flying pig!’).
I have a sneaking feeling this bit might be the real story.
‘In a separate development, Rangers confirmed a “review” of jobs is being carried out, although they said there was no programme of redundancies.’
Am I the only one wondering whether a ‘review of jobs’ might not lead to a ‘programme of redundancies’?
Ernie lynch
sounds about right otherwise why have a review?performance monitoring or maybe a wage rise due to the infux of 99p’s from the Big Bus parked for veiwing ootside the big hoos haa
Morning all.
I gather all is not well down Govan way. Ernie, I would second your wondering. There was a guy on Radio Scotland saying that other chairmen were not happy with Hearts signing Wilson after making others redundant. One wonders about all these “trialists” being signed, if they start making others redundant.
Just scrolled back on the night shift and one by Mickbhoy at 1.37 caught my eye, when he said he went to The Friars Walk Tavern in Cork and found the Tims in a corner watching a computer screen whilst Chelsea were on the main screen. The Friars Walk is a pub I know well the 2 brothers who run it are dyed in the wool Tims. SB Holders and I’ve met them at away games in places like Barcelona. There must be at least 6 large screens in that pub and yes they do show Premiership Games as well but I’ve been there countless times and Celtic always have pride of place there.
ernie lynch
I have a sneaking feeling this bit might be the real story.
Am I the only one wondering whether a ‘review of jobs’ might not lead to a ‘programme of redundancies’?
———————————
Hope the kit man is included… Did he have his personalised head cover as did the others….. hmm… Don’t think he did….Shoogly nail I think
HH
Morning CQN
According to twitter it seems Big Vic has sacked his agents, if true we might just yet get to keep him
Rangers have to keep an eye on their spending or face financial woe again
Michael Grant
Chief football writer
Monday 1 July 2013
I T is a simple question with an answer which manages to be both surprising and somehow all too familiar: which Scottish club has signed the most players this close season
Two questions regularly being asked around the game right now are “where are Rangers finding the money” and “are they heading for trouble”. At the time of their £22m share flotation in December, it was well enough known that the club was losing £1m a month. That was a staggering revelation and a damning indictment of the business model implemented by Charles Green’s consortium. Rangers shifted a phenomenal number of season tickets last year and the take-up for the share issue was impressive, too. But for the new regime to be haemorrhaging so much cash every month beggared belief.
Ever since, there have been plenty who feared – and just as many who hoped – the club was sleepwalking its way back into insolvency. To them, it still looks very much as though Rangers must be living beyond their means and repeating, albeit on a much smaller scale, the failures of judgment that got Sir David Murray into such catastrophic trouble in the first place and left him passing the buck to Craig Whyte.
In fact, there have been cost-cutting drives since the share issue. Carlos Bocanegra, Dorin Goian and Neil Alexander have just been moved out, taking around £45,000 off the weekly wage bill. Although Craig Mather is the interim chief executive picking up most of the money Green was on, Imran Ahmad will not be replaced as commercial director, which amounted to a considerable saving. Neil Murray, Tommy Wilson and Pip Yeates left as chief scout, reserve coach and physio respectively, with only the scouting role earmarked to be filled again (because a good scout will eventually pay for himself many times over). Some other staff around the club have also gone. Around £1m has come off the maintenance bill.
But it still costs around £1.5m per month to run Rangers and it works out that only around £1.1m is coming in. Season-ticket sales for the coming campaign stand at almost 28,000 after the deadline for renewals last Friday, with the figure expected to reach around 36,000-37,000 after they go on general sale. That amounts to about £10m to add to the £7m-£8m left in the bank from the share issue. But the fact remains: Rangers are running at a loss, and at a loss taken seriously enough within the club for jobs to be under review with the likelihood of a number of redundancies around Ibrox. They have to put a brake on spending. Mather has been asked by the board to cut costs and, inevitably, one of the routes he must go down is a cold, dispassionate look at which areas are carrying some expendable fat.
To those of us on the outside there seems to be only one answer to that: the playing department. Rangers have a squad of more than 30. This summer they’ve signed Scotland’s No.3 goalkeeper from Kilmarnock (giving him a substantial wage rise), two of the best players from two top-six clubs (Motherwell’s Nicky Law, Jon Daly from Dundee United), a Honduran internationalist (Arnold Peralta), and experienced former players Steven Smith and Richard Foster. None of those could remotely be described as extravagant deals and the wages are lower than the outrageous £6000-per-week plus bonuses given to Ian Black. But it still amounts to a considerable outlay for sledgehammers to crack a nut. Rangers are still only in the third tier, remember.
Although moving on Goian, Bocanegra and Alexander (Kane Hemmings has been the only other departure so far) means the players’ wage bill will come down, it is still way above the target figure of around £4m. Ally McCoist has wanted a centre-half all summer but signing an eighth new player, which would increase the size of his squad by four bodies since the end of the season, would be impossible to justify if staff who have been a part of the furniture for years get a tap on the shoulder and their P45.
Throughout the vast majority of his career, McCoist knew only big squads at Rangers, lots of players, options for every position. It is those who are most ingrained in the club’s customs who are bound to find it hardest to adjust to austerity, even after the destruction of last summer’s exodus and the Scottish Football Association registration embargo. Frankly, he has already built a squad which should be comfortably good enough to win not only SPFL League One but the SPFL Championship, as well, without the need for further additions.
But if he does try to land a defender, it surely isn’t going to happen until more players have been moved out. Rangers know they are still losing too much money, just as McCoist knows the manager doesn’t operate within a bubble. When it comes to pressure to make savings, no-one’s exempt.
lionroars67 08:45
Good news, a fella on the bbc world football phone in last week said he knew and stayed beside Wanyama’s agent, said he had been ‘frantically working to get Vic a new club.’
Unless Vic sacked him to get someone else who is better at getting him a new club…
EN
Lionsroar67
Southampton stated that his agents wanted a substantial fee for themselves.
A fee that Southampton refused to pay.
The removal of his agent makes a move even more likely , not less likely.
Still .
I would love him to sign an extension and stay another couple of seasons.
TT
Whither the cash strapped scrofulous hillbillies the day?
asonofdan
Good Morning from sunny Playa Blanca.
It looks like they still believe that if they repeat the previous acts of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic II all will be well this time as they steer their eyes away again from the iceberg. The MSM will never learn.
Frankly, he has already built a squad which should be comfortably good enough to win not only SPFL League One but the SPFL Championship, as well, without the need for further additions.
Eh?
First sighting of new ole Sevcomobile
It is also my view that PL will want Wanyama to move on.
He would be another selling feature to other aspiring unknowns to come to Celtic .
Play Euro fitba and move on .
Along with Ki.
Wanyama proves that it can be a very good move into the EPL riches to come to Celtic first.
TT
TinyTim
08:54 on
1 July, 2013
I posted> “we might get to keep him” IMO he was Celtic’s and Scotlands POTY we won’t replace him, he is that good, another good season in Europe and domestically and we can still sell for a very healthy fee, Neil’s on record as stating he has a good relationship with the player lets see what happens
Via twitter.
The Record are outdoing themselves now. Cherry picking leaks to suit their own agenda in order to protect Rangers and, ostensibly, Murray.
Have they forgotten that Murray ran the club into the ground? Have they forgotten Smith’s lavish spending helped him do that?
Twitter again.
Seriously, @Daily_Record, lay off Craig Whyte and turn your guns on Murray, the man who really did kill Rangers.
This scum rag will never go after Murray.
Twitter.
Daily Sevco states that there is a new development down in Sevconia…. A review of jobs but no redundancy programme… Oh dear
LIONROARS67
Tremendous news if true.
Especially for Big Vic. A young lad needs professional and impartial advice. Not someone looking to make a fast buck.
I suggested only yesterday to my sister that he should get rid of this agent as soon as he could. Is it possible for someone to give football agents a bad name? This guy has managed the impossible…
hen1rik
09:19 on 1 July, 2013
This scum rag will never go after Murray
what power does he still hold – why are the DR so pro Murray – what does he offer them – does the DR not realise he is yesterday’s man
BMCUWP,
I didnt think it would be so straight forward getting rid of an agent,contracts etc. If true though its a step in the right direction,and is it not fair to say MOST agents already have a bad name?
lilys granpa
Via Charlotte.
Insolvency Unit not the brightest. http://t.co/pb07qdoo8P and http://t.co/GAa2Z6tERd.
Here’s the list. Others more likely to be concerned #PissPoorDailyRecord http://t.co/4wS2oJ0CIo
charles kickham
09:22 on 1 July, 2013
Must have a lot on certain journo’s mate.