My friends in Celtic, we finish the year top of the league having just schooled our nearest rivals for the second time in two games. A dip in form ended just in time to see the club collect nine points from three games, with an important trip to St Mirren to complete before the winter break. All is right for three-in-a-row.
So why am I so worried? It’s about the strategic direction the club takes going forward. I don’t want to just win the league, or even just qualify for the Champions League. I am 56 years old, I want to see Celtic dive deep into that tournament. I want to see us achieve what Neil Lennon and Gordon Strachan did in Europe, even if the achievements of Jock Stein’s era are nothing more than a fantasy.
If we get everything right, I believe a successful football club can come from our league and achieve what the best in Holland or Portugal have done. To get there, we need to double down on what we are good at, improve where we can and avoid the obvious pitfalls.
Since 2021 we have concentrated development resources into players (largely) under 24 years old. Augmented by the significant contribution of a then-unknown (i.e. risky) Kyogo, this has delivered an enormous haul of trophies. Celtic finished a distant second in 2021 but have dropped only two domestic trophies since, a period in which their main rivals reached significant milestones in European competition.
Finding and developing players of the calibre of Carter-Vickers, Jota, Hatate, Maeda, O’Riley and Abada is so obviously where Celtic are as a club, it defies explanation (but here we are). The aforementioned benefited from arriving at the club during a period of rebuilt. In the squad, goalkeeper, defence, midfield and attack were all overhauled. The new arrivals got gametime and soon flourished.
This summer, our man outlays went on Nawrocki €5m, Palma, €4.75m, Lagerbielke €3.4m, Holm €3m, with an option to buy Bernardo for €6m. Palma was first to get a sustained opportunity and has thrived, scoring in the Champions League and recording assists in important games.
After a run of only three starts, Paulo Bernardo was the toast of Celtic Park. He contributes every inch as much as Matt O’Riley and at €6m is an absolute steal – IF we contribute to develop him correctly, and not allow him to wither on the vine.
Odin Holm (20) has the potential to be every bit as good as Paulo and Matt. He has had a terrible time with illness since arriving in Glasgow, but he will fully recuperate and by his peak years will be performing in a top European league.
For reasons I have not been able to fathom, Gustaf Lagerbielke’s face doesn’t seem to fit. The player has scarcely taken to the field, and when he did, he scored a Champions League winner, but minds have been made up.
On the other hand, great things are expected of Maik Nawrocki. He has endured persistent injuries since August, and was thrown into the deep end yesterday, but the consensus at Lennoxtown is that he will also play his peak years in a top European league.
If Celtic have been exceptional at anything in recent years, it is finding and developing great prospects. We need to do more of this, we need to look for ways to improve it, and we need to lead the club with this exceptional strategy. Convince the footballing world, if you have talent, Celtic will find it and grow it into something great.
Luck plays a part in football. Injuries, illness and opportunity can all determine whether or not a player is successful. But in this respect anyway, luck eventually evens itself out. Can we all agree, let’s have more of Cater-Vickers, Nawrocki, Jota, Palma, Abada, Holm and Hatate.
So with the strategic plan clearly so successful why am I worried? We lose two league games, get our backsides handed to us in Madrid, and we want a quick and lazy fix (which will not work).
This “we need more experienced players” harks back to past successes, like the phenomenal Scott Sinclair. But Scott came 8 years ago and the world has changed since then. “More experience players” means fewer like Nawrocki and more like Nat Phillips. Nat is 26, has experience in the EPL and Champions League with Liverpool and is exactly the player we can expect to sign when we go for “more experience”.
Nat is not the only example. Let me disturb your afternoon with memories of Duffy, Laxalt, Bauer, Marvelous Marvin Compper, Gamboa, Toure and (still on the payroll) James McCarthy! Look across the city. They have gone full pelt with this strategy; Lammers, Dessers, Danilo, Dowell, the wee boy with the tints in his hair, Davies and Lundstrum.
It’s not cheap either. Despite being universally acknowledged as being rubbish, they have a higher payroll than Celtic; Dessers is on £30k per week and that big lump Lundstrum banks £40k a week to traipse around in Callum McGregor’s shadow.
It is a strategy, but it’s a rubbish one. It leads to a development dead end, not just with respect of the players, but for the club as a whole. The chances of bringing a Scott Sinclair-type talent to Scottish football are remote, this is what “more experienced” looks like and it isn’t pretty.
This is where we are: Nawrocki or Phillips, Bernardo or Lammers. There is only one way forward for Celtic, do more of what we are good at, do it ruthlessly, without exception. Even Brendan should have personal developmental goals. This is where Alex Ferguson was so exceptional and others (Martin, even Jock), didn’t adapt. Managers need to be confident enough to disarm and learn.
It’s also worth correcting a commonly held belief that Celtic have a particularly young team. If our preferred starting 11 includes Abada and Hatate instead of Palma and Bernardo in yesterday’s line-up, the average age is 26.6 years. We are a team with a decent range of youth and experience.
Jota, Carter-Vickers et al gave us a reputation as a great place to for a young prospect to come to. If we screw up with the (also very good) most recent crop of recruits, we will not get next season’s crop, they will go elsewhere.
The next two transfer windows are pivotal to the direction of the club. The manner in which we won the game yesterday, with Bernardo and Nawrocki writing the script, adds valuable perspective on where we are and where we should be moving. Double down, be the best and what we are very good at, no reverse gear, no Phillips, Duffys, Comppers in a vain effort to find Sinclair.
Our condolences to the family of Len Murray, Celtic fan, lawyer and twice guest speaker at the CQN Golf Day. Len was a warm man of great intellect and a devastatingly entertaining manner.
Many thanks to those who helped me on CQN this year, Alex Gordon in particular and the two Mods (one on temp vacation) – honestly the worst role in football!
Thanks also for everyone who drops in to give their thoughts or only for a read. I know so many people I respect who read this stuff. Not everyone ‘gets’ this club. You can see the intelletual sneering in some who have left grubby matters like thier football team behind; they have no idea what they have lost. It is a tonic to know my Celtic addition is shared by people I like. This is who we are, it is our link to the generations past and forward, and for some of us, that really matters.
Take care and have a great 2024!
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BRRB
You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone.
Brian
BRRB
In a Celtic context.
Brian
It has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that given the laws of the game Rangers could not have been awarded a ‘penalty’. The manager’s synthetic fury is just sour grapes. No doubt he has a Messiah complex from the lavish praise heaped on him by the MSSM.
When they haven’t a leg to stand on the Ibrox playbook is always the same. Who can forget, ‘Who are these people?’ The strategy is to foment hysteria over this ‘denial’ then let slip their useful idiots in the press. On another topic from Saturday – you can bet your bottom dollar that there will be no mention of spit boy’s exit antics in our press.
Team for Tuesday;
Joe, Shamrock Rover, Big Maik, Greg, Canadian Bruiser, Paulo, Captain, Matt, Luis, Kyogo, Daizen.
Brendan told me tonight in the Victoria Bar. You heard it here first. And ignored it. 😂😂
Aye indeed Brian.
Belmont Brian 9.06pm/9.07pm
In every sense … probably far more than Celtic
Hope you & the family have a great 2024 and am sure yesterday certainly ended 2023 well :-)
*SENTINEL CELTS PLAYER OF THE YEAR 2023-24*
*RESULTS FROM GAME #28 CELTIC 2 R2NGERS 1 (BERNARDO, KYOGO)*
Good evening, friends.
We bring 2023 to an end by extending our lead at the top to 8 points. Celtic Park was bursting to the seams with 60,000 good looking men, women and children and brought a fantastic atmosphere to the latest Glasgow Derby, particularly during the second half.
I felt that we were a little slow to come out of the traps and noticed both Brendan and Calmac encouraging the players to up the pace a bit, which we did as the half wore on. And we were rewarded on 25 minutes when a stunning strike from the ever improving Paulo Bernardo nestled in the net. Bedlam ensued and we reached the half time break a goal to the good – despite the referee allowing almost 4 additional minutes even though the board indicated that just 2 would be added. My half time pie and hot Bovril set me up for an even better second half.
So, what about that goal from Kyogo, just 2 minutes into the second half? Great build up play and then everything you look for in a striker, clever movement and a stunning strike. And boy, did the wee man just love it, Taking the deserved adulation and regularly gesturing to the fans to be even noisier!
Then, on 71 minutes it looked as if the points were safe after Balogen was shown a straight red for denying a clear goalscoring opportunity without making any attempt to play the ball. Cynically, some around me doubted whether it really was a clear goalscoring opportunity given that it was Maeda who would have been bearing down on goal but hey, ho.
We should have probably done a bit better against their 10 men and a third goal may have seen a total collapse from them. But instead we actually became a little sloppy giving away cheap possession and fouls. And when Tavanier scored on the 88th minute it did get a little tense in the East End. And as there had been 2 long stoppages during the second half I had prepared myself for at least 10 minutes to be added. I was pleasantly surprised when the board showed only 8 but equally annoyed when the ref actually played an extra 12!
In the end, a really huge 3 points and a wee kick in the teeth for their latest best ever manager.
And so to the voting. Firstly, please accept my apologies again for not having the time to respond to individual emails. Thank you to everyone who included nice wishes and thoughts for doing this daft wee venture and I hope that everyone reading this also has a very happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.
Yesterday’s man of the match picked up just his 2nd such award of this season. His first was at Ibrox back in September. He clearly saves his best form for these games!
We have now played 28 games and have 17 wins, 4 draws and 7 defeats, scoring 55 goals and conceding 30.
My thanks to the 79 who voted this time around. The total votes cast for each player are as follows, with my own nominations asterisked.
Hart: 0
Johnston, A: 1
Welsh: 0
Scales: 20
Taylor*: 12
McGregor*: 79 (a nomination from every single voter!)
O’Riley: 30
Bernardo*: 58
Maeda: 0
Kyogo: 32
Palma: 0
Nawrocki: 5
Turnbull: 0
Oh: 0
Johnston, M: 0
Abada: 0
And so, the players receiving POINTS for the game against Triggers Broom FC are –
McGregor – 5 points
Bernardo – 4 points
Kyogo – 3 points
O’Riley – 2 points
Scales – 1 point
The overall positions after 28 games played are as follows –
73 points – Scales
64 points – O’Riley
46 points – McGregor
33 points – Carter-Vickers
27 points – Palma
22 points – Kyogo
20 points – Oh
18 points – Maeda
16 points – Johnston, A and Yang
13 points – Bernardo
12 points – Hart
9 points – Johnston M, Nawrocki, Taylor and Turnbull
6 points – Iwata, Lagerbielke and Ralston
5 points – Hatate
4 points – Bain
3 points – Forrest
1 point – Holm
0 points – Abada, Bernabei, Frame, Haksabanovic, Phillips, Starfelt, Tilio and Welsh
*DECEMBER PLAYER OF THE MONTH*
The Player Of The Month award is based simply on the total votes received across all games played. There were 8 games during December – St Johnstone, Hibs, Kilmarnock, Feyenoord, Hearts, Livingston, Dundee and The Zombies.
In 3rd place with 184 votes is Matt O’Riley and the runner up on 186 votes is Liam Scales. But the clear winner and December’s Player Of The Month with 281 votes is Calum McGregor.
So far the monthly winners have been –
August: Kyogo (4 games, 164 votes, average 41)
September: O’Riley (5 games, 259 votes, average 52)
October: Scales (5 games, 243 votes, average 49)
November: Scales (6 games, 191 votes, average 32)
December: McGregor (8 games, 281 votes, average 35)
One more league game before the winter break sees us travel to Paisley on Tuesday for a 5pm kick off away to St Mirren
Hail Hail!
BRB
“They paved paradise and put up the parking lot” wee Joni
Pedantry CSC
Malone Bhoy,
Sorry,so wrong mate.Go onto you Tube and watch him play for Elche.Hitting 30- 40 yard passes out of defence,tackling everything,even does a Kenny Miller on a guy putting him 4 feet in the air.Heading out every cross into his area.
Have a look ,will change your opinion.we have seen nothing of this boy at Celtic yet.Voted best defender in Sweden,last year.Picked now 5 times for Sweden.Have a look,and then get back to me.
Anyway,
A HAPPY TURKISH TIME ,NEW YEAR TO ALL.
BOURNESOUPRECIPE
I knew I got that wrong. 👍😂
Wee Joni – a bit older
Happy New Year CSC
just watched game again. Celtic were comfortable until last 10mins with a great team performance and quality goals.
Weakness throughout and over the last few weeks is Maeda – he offered absolutely nothing and was infuriating to watch. Surprisingly, rogers didn’t replace him with Yang. He has been brilliant when used in the last few games – whether beating a man or finding and positive pass inside. Everything Maeda hasn’t been doing.
Also – do him and Kyogo like each other ?? they refuse to pass to each other AND watch Maeda when Kyogo scores. He doesn’t celebrate , possibly bcoz Kyoto didn’t play him in. Something’s broken there!!
On the selfish note – when we were 2-1 up Abada should have slipped in O’reily as should Palma – 2-1 but. should have been 3 or 4.
Look forward to January and a # 9 to get onto the end of the quality delivered into the box.
!!BADA BING!! on 31ST DECEMBER 2023 8:21 PM
Been saying for years,we should be looking at mid to bottom teams in Serie A and La Liga for good experienced pro’s,not every player is on 40-50 k a week, think Enrico Annoni,a property trained defender and man marker
_____
Great shout. Totally agree, there are plenty of older pros there who would help our younger guys thrive. I don’t like the sound of the article Mantra that’s straight out if the Peter ‘you have to kiss a lot of frogs’ manual. Fair enough, we understand the model but we need to have a balance.
https://e0.365dm.com/23/12/1600×900/skysports-celtic-rangers-kyogo_6407542.jpg?20231230140228
https://e0.365dm.com/23/12/1600×900/skysports-paulo-bernardo-celtic_6407496.jpg?20231230132028
https://www.irishtimes.com/resizer/0sQ8KUSWGpcJdoN_INWww4e5_XM=/1600×0/filters:format(jpg):quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/4XINH6KF2TMVWM6OHVDBD6J47I.jpg
BBC Radio 4 recently did a series about Joni Mitchell charting the different periods of her career and life and wider influence of her music. It’s well worth listening to.
Yesterday Clement accused the officials of covering the non-penalty decision by releasing the offside footage later. Will there be an audio of “Willie, Willie” released to confirm the conspiracy theory? I presume that all referees in Scotland will be so outraged at the thought of it that they will go on strike or take out their wrath on Rangers for the rest of the season.
A likely 2 point lead at this stage of the season is disappointing given the points that they have dropped but we know what we need to do from here and we have a platform to do it.
One more title and we equal oldco and can go for their combined 54 + 1, or 55 as we we can call it.
My best wishes to Paul and everyone on here for 2024.
All the best to Paul67 and all who post on here when it comes.
Thank you for being here. HH
They knocked down the school
And put up a parking lot
corporateonetoocsc
watched footballs funniest moments on some free sky channel
one of those moments was pogba putting his hands in front of his face to stop a shot – west hame v man u
penalty
west ham player took the piss out of it discussing with man u player as they came out for the second half
up here – gouldson v us last season – nothing to see here…
btw, if the huns think theres something to listen to on the audio tapes, who told them ????
hope they get it and it means all audios will be released – nah…..
I may have missed the quotes from Mr (in)Clement gracefully congratulating Celtic for their general dominance of the fixture and for his (more experienced) managerial counterpart who got his charges up for the game? Or was it just they reported snarlings of an Alpha Darkseeker blinking in the glare of wide public humiliation?
——–
Good article p67 and thanks for the amenity you give us all here. One point of contention tho…
“There is only one way forward for Celtic, do more of what we are good at, do it ruthlessly, without exception.”
A wee bit more flexibility within the cusp-of-greatness model wouldn’t do us any harm. And would give the manager a sense he will be given the onfield reassurance and reinforcements he has lobbied for.
Exclusively focussing on yoof, means we could miss out on the Harts, the Mooys and the Furahashis of the world.
HH
Rod Stewart and the Mary Wallopers on Jools Holland could result in a small earthquake being recorded in the west of Scotland
Broadsword calling Danny Bhoy
Well that’s 2024 started … looks like
Brendan is top of the league
We shall not be moved 🍀🍀🍀
Happy New Year everyone. HH
Happy New Year All the bhoys old and new on CQN.
HAIL HAIL.
KLV
Happy New Year to all the Tims on here, posters, lurkers and of course our host Paul.
Happy New Year Weefra.
January 2024
The Scott McKenna windae
See that Peter Lawell he wants to see Cantwell & Phil Clemente (sic) winning this league
(Apologies WITS my sarcasm isn’t up to your standard)
Happy and healthy New year to all on CQN.
Happy New Year you absolute shower. 👍😁
Belmont Brian I will be there for my big mucker Big Jimmy.
Whenever it is.
No ifs no buts.
D. :)
Guys Scott Mckenna is no better than Narowski.
Come on.
Let’s train, coach and nurture Narowski.
D. :)
Weefra back when I was a lurker and my dear friend Garry (delaneys dunky) was still with us I used to love your tales of the old homestead.
I hope you are well and rest assured your posts will live on in cqn folklore.
God bless.
D. :)
David66 1.52am
I remember you and Garry reconnecting on here, I think I am lucky enough to have had a beer or twenty with him, I have probably posted this before but a CQN day in the Bon Accord at Charing Cross (Hot Smoked should remember) anyhow … France v Argentina .. all day long Garry (with 2 r’s) shouted “viva la France” all day long.., think France won 5-4…. So am leaving the boozer (blitzed) about 7pm heading towards Charing X train station … the bold Delaneys Dunky outside having a “smoke” shouts … “haw Gerry where are you going” I respond hometown … Garry shouts “Viva la France” 🇫🇷 wished I had stayed now … gone but never forgotten 💚
I may celebrate today. And that Chilterns geezer will be on soon saying it’s a grand day to be a Tim. He’s right ye know.