“Sell Out Saturday, show everyone the SPL doesn’t need the Old Firm to thrive”. Discuss.
You have to admire the Aberdeen fans, and fans of every other club in the league, even Kilmarnock fans, who are clearly infuriated by the actions of their chairman. For perhaps the first time in history they have stood up to their clubs and football administrators and effected real and genuine change in our game.
Aberdeen fans produced this Sell-out Saturday graphic, urging people to “show everyone the SPL doesn’t need the Old Firm to thrive”. By ‘Old Firm’ I am sure they don’t mean the cash-cow rivalry Celtic had with Rangers, they mean without Rangers, and without Celtic too.
For every other club in the SPL, Celtic are now their most precious visiting brand. For fans of every other club in the SPL, Celtic are a competitive irrelevance. This season our income is likely to be greater than that of every other club in the league. We pay superstar wages while, for the most part, they pay real world footballers real world compensation.
In short, the SPL doesn’t need the SPL to thrive. The clubs may (or may not) believe they need Celtic to pay bills, but recent events have demonstrated that might not be the case.
There is another problem to consider. If the SPL keeps Celtic, in a decade or so they will have Newco-Rangers, and the whole dysfunctional business will start all over again. Kick Celtic out now and Newco-Rangers will never materialise in the manner it would if Celtic remained.
SPL fan power has one more club to sort out.
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I remember a pre season friendly 87/88 season at CP against Arsenal, they destroyed us 5-1 that day, total gulf in class,ability and athleticism but we learned more from that game than 30 victories in Scotland and went on to win the double in our centenary year. I’m hacked off at this today but it is what it is, a pre season getting up to speed game although it’d be nice to see our team playing a bit better in these games.
HH
theweegreenman on 21 July, 2012 at 19:50 said:
This is still the same young team that started badly in the Euro campaign last season.
Would it be rude to ask for us to improve on last years squad? If not the same thing will happen again.
BigChipsUK at 19:44, spot on
gallagher on 21 July, 2012 at 19:53 said:
Remember that game to,no CQN in those
days ,so we all just panicked in the pub.
Till tomorrow Bhoys & Ghirls
May all your days be blessed and remember it could be
MUCH MUCH MUCH worse you could be a sevco fan
HAIL HAIL
Tonight didn’t show us anything that we didn’t already know, as far as Europe is concerned we have a long way to go, some of our players are SPL efficient but show up at higher levels.
Ajax are a decent team, skillful and fast thinking, Celtic can and will play better than we played tonight.
We are short in a few departments and although many are shouting for centre halves and forwards I think we really struggle in midfield, tonight we had no one who could pass the ball.
Helsinki are not Ajax or even close to being Ajax, I would expect us to do much better against them.
And Ghod if your looking in send us the new Chris Sutton please quick as you like, yours the Celtic Support…
Jmccormick
We lost the experience of big Dan
HH
Didn’t see game so can’t really comment on performance.
However, we seldom play well pre-season. In fact, often our players appear completely out of condition in the early weeks of the season.
In the old days this wasn’t much of a problem, but with CL qualifiers in July we simply can’t afford to start the season slowly.
I don’t think these “glamour” games do us any favours – our brand is weakened by these hammerings (I dread to think what Madrid will do). Much better to play lots of games against diddy teams to get confidence and fitness levels up.
As for squad strengthening – we can all see the problems. But there seems to be a real lack of desire to fix them. I think the attitude remains “we’ll do the bare minimum to scrape by”.
Helsinki will be the crux: lose that tie and we will need to have a serious rethink on strategy.
Ah well!
Add that one to the loss to Man U reserves and others that I have erased from my memory.
Neither can I recall a pre-season win of any significance or portent.
We need to be in shape to beat the Aberdeens and Helsinkis of this world. We have a long haul to go till we become a right good team.
Expect to see a few hundercover posters appearing later.
the stats for referees in the spl this season should make interesting reading- wonder how it will go-i reckon there will be less violent tackles-i hope anyway-could be a season of blooming football-wouldnt that girut-a season where families swelled the crowds of all clubs to take back the beautiful game from the malign-3+ years of peace in the spl-3+ years to enlighten and educate the rising newco and try and stop it being a corpse rising from a crypt-aye who am i kidding
–
Caught the last 20 mins of the game.
Dont care if we lost all our friendlies, as long as we do the biz when it really matters.
I thought ajax were a bit physical.young forrest and twarzic put up in the air regularly.
We didnt do that to them,(probs because we couldnt catch them).
gallagher on 21 July, 2012 at 19:53 said:
I remember that game and being in the pub afterwards despondent at the gulf in class and some wise person said you learn more getting spanked than a million walkover wins…
Maybe already posted, but BBC’s Chris Mclaughlin saying Rangers wants dual-contract investigation dropped as part of deal with SFA…
jmccormick on 21 July, 2012 at 19:54 said:
Things have changed since last season. SSM will be tightening the belt.
I think the Europa is more our level as I don’t think we will be getting replacements any time soon.
Just my opinion mind. :-)
Starry
Our midfield are given to big a task due to slow defenders , wide full backs, and weak – strength wise forwards, Sammi excepted.
Todays performance looked like it came from a team who hope that they are already on their way out
HH
Based on that display what player would come to Celtic if he had options. Precious few. And the state of our league doesnt help. Life in the slow lane indeed.
Pretty dismal performance – if we are going to be so uncompetitive the board should advise fans not to travel or travel for the non footballing reasons
Against the Finns we need to make sure we stay in the tie as long as possible – that means not giving away cheap goals at CP
We need to pack the midfield – get a grip of the the game and build from there
We need to avoid being caught cold as we were several times last season in Europe – home and away
We need to go 4-5-1
FF
AM TR CM IE
SB BK VW JL KC
GS or GH
The back four are a major concern but we have to go with what we have
We are / should be strongest in the midfield so need to use that to our advantage
HH
Just back from 3 weeks in a hillside Andalucian villa, lots of sun, relaxation and no internet access. I take it the signings Lenny wanted done early didn’t happen???
I still think it’s amazing what a quality centre half brings.The ability to organise sends a confidence through the whole team.
voguepunter on 21 July, 2012 at 19:54 said:
At least you were safe, panickin in the pub an that :)
HH
starry plough on 21 July, 2012 at 19:58 said
Wiznae me i didn’t know that back then :)
HH
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo on 21 July, 2012 at 20:00 said:
I missed most of the first half, the wean barfed her dinner!! What I saw Izzy looked lost out on the wing, thought Ledley started well, Broonie the enigma in the middle, defence looked as slow as a week in St Gallen!
I’m a Ki fan I know that don’t sit well with many but he can hold the ball, I’m worried that Kayal might be a crock then we have probs centre mid..
Like young Twardzik though, looks like he can play and is not a pansy!
Scottish standard football has been woeful for years we always have to puunch above our weight..
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo on 21 July, 2012 at 19:56 said
Yes , that`s true ,but why no replacement, he was not that great either, in my opinion.
?theweegreenman on 21 July, 2012 at 19:59 said:
Agreed , but cannot afford to allow our standards to drop too low. The future of our club is all bound by how we perform in Europe. In 10 years or sooner the EPL and other big leagues will be looking to form new competitions to maintain global interest. EUFA will go along as they know the value of the product. SPL is currnelty a backwater but it can get worse than that.
lucky cody on 21 July, 2012 at 19:50 said:
Algarvian judgement will be the Helsinki game and based on what has happened in pre season plus lack of strengthening it does not augur well. We have released (correctly) a number of players , however we have not fixed the sieve ( even polish players transfer was cancelled).
Can’t blame us for cancelling the Polish guy after he got crocked?
Peter Lawwell runs Celtic in every aspect , with Lenny just picking the Team. Lenny will need to fight hard to get money to strengthen the Team. When I say he is out of his depth , I include dealing with our CEO.
Lawell runs Celtic to be financially secure, i am fed up arguing with folk on here, who seemed to have wanted us to go the sevco route.
Neil Lennon has a very fine record as a Celtic manager, go compare.
This team needs 2 centre halfs and a striker and has done for 2 seasons. No sign of this being addressed , which means failure in Europe.
I agree we need at least one, if not 2 centre halfs, we need to ship players out first, that’s life.
Neil Lennon is ainm dom (nohunlover) on 21 July, 2012 at 19:58 said:
Maybe already posted, but BBC’s Chris Mclaughlin saying Rangers wants dual-contract investigation dropped as part of deal with SFA…
………………………………………………………………
I think that McCoist and Green are asking for the impossible so that when they have no licence to take part they will be able to blame it on bad SFA.
This will suit McCoist as he wants out of the Div 3 coo kicker’s league and Chuck wants a year out to find a buyer.
See what happens when we don’t have Rangers in the SPL?
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo on 21 July, 2012 at 19:42 said:
So’s your language
A son of dan
Hope that wasn’t aimed at me am there home and away :-(
Neil Lennon is aimn dom (no hunlover) at 19:58.
I dont think euefa or fifa would agree with that.
Starry
Looks like your princess has the gift of second sight.
Jmccormick,
Exactly bud.
HH
theglasgowcelticway (9:50): “Roll on Real Madrid.”
YorkshireCQN understands that Real Madrid are frantically scouring the leagues in Europe and South America in a desperate search for quality reinforcements ahead of their upcoming clash with the mighty Glasgow Celtic.
Other comments on the game…
Was there a clash between our Green & Whyte hoops and the Ajax strip? I note that we were wearing our change kit… and we all know what happens when Celtic play in their change kit.
With big Chaz on the pitch we conceded three goals and gave away the penalty which led to the fourth goal conceded. Without big Chaz we conceded no goals other than the conversion of the penalty that he himself conceded. Perhaps it is time to send him to Sevco on loan to pick up a bit more competitive match experience?
Evening all.
I haven’t seen the game; so, I can’t really comment. What I will say is that the 2 players we really need in Europe weren’t playing: Ki and Kayal.
Calls for us change a policy that has kept us out of thems’ situation are, at best, misguided. We play in the SPL. That’s where the change has to come. Every team must adopt an attitude of playing the game properly, i.e putting technique and skill before blood and guts.
Big Nan on 21 July, 2012 at 20:07 said:
That would make sense. By natural law alone, there is no way the SFA could trade-off breaches of rules which directly affected innocent third parties (i.e. Celtic and every other team in Scotland).
HH
an absolute masterclass from Ajax
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo on 21 July, 2012 at 20:10 said:
Hahaha right at the kick off too..
bbbbbbbbbbbzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
bbbbbbbbzzzzzzzzzzzz
bbbbbbzzzzzzzzzz
i couldnt give a ratz ass about these games, they mean nothing other than getting the legs going again
What a shock… Ajax keeps a clean sheet.
67heaven
Deservedly so. I have read many and much worse violations recently and never heard s squeak from you. I will take that chastisement as a compliment.
Thanks
HH
As I see it neither Chuck nor Alistair want Div 3 football this year.
Alistair wants to walk with his No Surrender credentials in order and Chuck wants to sell The Rangers or parts thereof.