The reaction of Hearts fans to Neil Critchley’s appointment as Hearts manager reminded me of the summer of 2005, when Gordon Strachan arrived at Celtic. Gordon had been out of work for over a year and had been seen by some supporters as a regressive step.
He had an impossible task: follow Martin O’Neill, a club legend, win the league and do so without the financial overspend which characterised every season under Martin (including the fabled Seville season).
By any objective measure, Gordon was an outstanding success. He picked up a squad which, without Henrik Larsson, died on its feet the previous season, and just like Ange Postecoglou in 2021, had a disastrous Champions League qualifying campaign, but built a squad which won the league and twice took us to the last 16 of Europe’s top table.
Hearts fans do not like Critchley because he was sacked by Blackpool after a year in the post and lasted less than three months at Queens Park Rangers (where he was asked to pick up the pieces after Michael Beale left for Newco).
I know little about Critchley but there is one reason to believe he will be a success – his appointment was recommended by Brighton owner and potential Hearts investor, Tony Bloom. Bloom is a professional gambler and one of the sharpest minds in analytics.
There are two things Bloom wants from his managers: excel in his valuable and confidential Key Performance Indicators, and just as importantly, be onboard with the plan. KPIs in football, including management, are notoriously difficult to assess, as an individual’s performance is overwhelmingly dependent on the performance of external factors.
Bloom’s method of assessing: Critchley or Naismith, O’Riley or Hatate, has made him enormously effective. Just as importantly, even amateur gamblers like me would bet that Critchley will do what he is told to do in building and developing the squad.
There is no room for managerial egos, gurus do not exist in football, and for clubs to reach their potential, development plans need to be followed ruthlessly.
It is unlikely Brighton or Hearts will ever win their leagues, but with ruthless devotion to analytics so seldom followed at other clubs, they have a punter’s chance. Keep your eye on Bloom; everyone else is playing catch up.
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Testing
Naismith is a hun rat
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/cy5yzk3wyp4o
MAJESTIC HARTSON: Email sent to you for forwarding to FAVOURITE UNCLE please.
MakeitworkCSC
Will do Sargassosea.
Favourite Uncle if you send your details to my email –
gerryhartother@gmail.com I’ll pass your details on 👍
I wasn’t the biggest fan of Naismith as a person on the pitch – thought he was a good player but had hunnish traits – but as mentioned earlier he did a lot of good for the poor.
He fed the poor/homeless on Christmas day and he bought a number of season tickets at Everton to give to the unemployed.
Brother Walfrid would have been impressed. 👍
Good luck to Carpe Diem and all the others who set off on the Camino.
Naismith – oh and the only team he had taken points off for most of the season was the Huns on the first day of the season.
From pals who have met Naibalance, avoid
Neither Naismith, or Kevin Thompson, or even Novo, were rat’s until they joined the Huns during McSleekit’s influential days as Hun assistant to Sir Walter.
MON even tried to buy Novo and Caniggia from Dundee and either the Celtic PLC didn’t play ball with MON, or these players were tipped off about the Hun EBT system?
.
You can bet Brendan had a long meeting with our new recruitment guy,then a long chat with DD,who then gave the green light to the Board.
We are getting there.
Even big McLeish wasn’t a sleekit till he took a sip from the loving cup that even Jack McGinn as chairman sipped after we lost 0-2 at Ibrox one New Year’s Day.
CHAIRBHOY on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 3:53 PM
It was a simple reply to your suggestion that CQN had never acknowledged MONs part in Celtics history or give him the credit he was due.
The implication was clear. A cheap shot, easily disproved.
I don’t know enough about Steven Naismith to label him one thing, or, another. There are however a couple of things I do know. He was deeply involved in charity work for the homeless during his time at Everton, on a smaller scale, but not unlike the kind of thing that Lou Macari does at The Macari Centre in Stoke on Trent. When Rangers FC went belly-up in 2012, he along with some notable others declined to be TUPED into Green’s Sevco – not the kind of behaviour you would expect from a dyed in wool h**. He is still reviled by many down Ibrox way.
As for his actions on the park, well many things happen that look much worse from the stands and usually the players involved make light of it after the match.
We were discussing Gordon Strachan earlier and his positive impact at Celtic, his son Gaviin carries on the family tradition, however I well remember one of our number racing from the jungle and attempting to ‘do’ the wee man in a game against Aberdeen. Strachan, like Naismith, was something of a hate figure among some Celtic fans at the time. All one can say now with the benefit of hindsight is “how wrong can you be?”. HH
Tisdales appointment looks extremely promising, results are what matters of course, but the noise around him is very positive.
There’s no guarantees that he’s been brought in to do the same at Celtic, but he’s been lauded for his work at Exeter where he had a great record of developing young signings and academy graduates.
“I go into football clubs and I try to find performance-improvement solutions using data and also my experience as a coach.
“I can translate very well from the boardroom to the pitch, and from the pitch to the boardroom, and also deliver CPD or coach mentoring.”
He’s also been mentioned as being involved in the Summer window. It’s encouraging that Brendan highlighted the role of the scouting department in Engels signing, hopefully we’ll see more Arne’s in future windows.
A club statement read: “Celtic Football Club is delighted to announce the appointment of Paul Tisdale as Celtic’s Head of Football Operations.
“In this new strategic role reporting to the Board, Paul will oversee the development and management of effective operations to support high-level football performance, including the identification and development of talent, in line with the club’s objective to develop Champions League players through our Academy and recruitment processes.
“Additionally, Paul will work with the club’s analytics functions, supporting colleagues across the club to continuously improve our processes.
Very promising
It does look like we’ve brought in an expert to do the work that’s been talked about
https://substack.com/@empiresdown/note/c-72027849?r=bc5xc&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action
.https://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/dec/10/steven-naismith-christmas-dinner-glasgow-homeless-everton
CELTIC40ME on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 7:04 PM
CHAIRBHOY
It was a simplistic reply..
What I stated…
Still, nice to see Martin being acknowledged Club legend status.
Is that a first in a CQN lead.!?
What the lead stated.
“He had an impossible task: follow Martin O’Neill, a club legend, win the league and do so without the financial overspend which characterised every season under Martin (including the fabled Seville season).
Where did you prove that another CQN lead had “Club Legend”
Granted the “financial overspend” and “fabled Seville season” had an element of the backhanded complement yet, the unequivocal Club Legend status was good to read and I most certainly can’t remember a lead stating that before.
Hail Hail
Burnley78 earlier – really good post.
BOB LOBLAW on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 3:16 PM
You can think or say all you want about Steven Naismith as a footballer or coach/ manager, but he is a thoroughly decent individual. Check out the work he has done for years with the Loaves and Fishes charity before passing judgement
*correct but that’s when he refused to tupe over and bailed oot along with other die hard “huns” like their thug goalie and “bette” davis who were both welcomed back, cant remember any talk of him returning there, possibly because he left on a free and so did them out of a transfer fee.
When he was a young player with killie a young ayrshire tim on the famed “big lhist” raved about him stating that he was light years ahead of boydchencko and we should look at him.
WGS in fact did and was set tae sign him when mcsleekit took a visit tae his former club and talked him intae hanging on till they “found” the necessary funds, which they did 19 seconds before the windae closed, it was then that he turned fae the nice wee lad that he was intae “nasty” and in fact in an effort to injure a fellow professional he allegedly injured himself and was out of the for up to a year.
Anyway, he made is comeback and it looked as if he had got nastier, but that self importance trait took over when his local rag and bone man sold his club for a county down and he then took off for pastures new, the Toffees, long believed tae be a ben affleck side, which was surprising but money talks.
As has been mentioned quite often here he does support the less fortunate of us predominately homeless shelters, so he truly is a contradiction, but how many nice guys join them and then have their heids turned,
As oj said “Neither Naismith, or Kevin Thompson, or even Novo, were rat’s until they joined the Huns during McSleekit’s influential days as Hun assistant to Sir Walter.”
As my da used tae say “if you fly with the craws you’ll get shot with them”.
“MON even tried to buy Novo and Caniggia from Dundee and either the Celtic PLC didn’t play ball with MON, or these players were tipped off about the Hun EBT system”
I think it would have been the latter, ironically caniggia’s boy used tae wear Celtic paraphernalia.
Does the league need a strong Hearts?
answers on a postcode
I think earlier comment about the org chart is fair.
Otherwise statement announcing the new guy is excellent.
CEO response / manager response / new start message.
Brendan’s comments seem just too praising to be empty.
He sounds like he is happy.
CHAIRBHOY on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 7:58 PM
“Where did you prove that another CQN lead had “Club Legend”
I think “Celtic royalty” covers it
Not smart.
https://celtsarehere.com/uefa-celtics-handed-e20k-fine-and-suspended-away-day-ban/
BACK TO BASICS – GLASS HALF FULL on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 8:13 PM
Celtic are at their best when everyone is happy in their work
Hopefully it will help the atmosphere on CQN as well, it does look like the appointment addresses my concerns
majestichartson email sent.THANKS.
JACKIEMAC@8.11
Does the league need a strong Hearts?
Well , a Hearts side that would make a decent effort against their big cousins would be a start .
You’ve got to wonder what goes on in the heads of these people.
They’re undeniably thick, but I don’’t believe they are so thick that they do not realise what they are doing endangers others or brings the club in to disrepute.
So why do they do it??
Celtic40me at 8:26pm.
Agreed.
The possibility our club’s key employees have a uniformity of purpose and don’t actually hate each other seems to be beyond some.
B2B@8:22
Yes noticed that from the DR however can’t see anything in the DR about the huns fine, from another rag:
JOHN GILLIGAN has urged Ibrox fans to ditch the pyros after Rangers were hit with a whopping £28,000 fine.
Found it in the DR under another banner, certainly not as obvious as our one!
BACK TO BASICS – GLASS HALF FULL on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 8:48 PM
Yeah, and you don’t get to where they are without a thick skin.
ORDINARY JOE on 16TH OCTOBER 2024 6:54 PM
Even big McLeish wasn’t a sleekit till he took a sip from the loving cup
*just watch the footage of sheep games against them when he and willie miller were at the heart of their defence, they took no prisoners, in fact when Jock selected his side for the Brazil WC game in 82 I was dumfounded that he had left mcleish out selecting a half back line of narey miller and hansen, all 3 left sided defencemen but had left out the centre half that had the big baw faced pie man in his pocket all season, ok he did bring him on for asa hartdord after Brazil had takin a 3-1 lead but too little too late
A year later Scotland played Canada in a friendly at Lamport Stadium in Toronto, the only time I have ever seen the national side live, btw Charlie Nic was booed from the start to the finish even though he had left u for the arse and als oscored Scotland’s opening goal.
Anyway, there was a new CSC called the Toronto West operating out of Missisauga who on hearing the national side was coming over arranged for a dinner dance for them plus officials and members of the press, the only one of the latter that came was big doug baillie, former hun defender, who happily told one and all that his son was on Celtic’s books.
Big mcleish was very affable that night and told them that big Billy was desperate tae sign him but the future Sir Furious widnae let him go although as he said he would have signed for us in a heart beat.
BTW that’s the same manager that widnae let Billy sign WGS and yet a year later let him join manure
I have no idea how good Paul Tisdale is or isn’t.
I have no idea how good he will be at Celtic.
I won’t judge him on his rather unimpressive management career ( Bath, Exeter City, MK Dons, Bristol Rovers and Stevenage). His percentage win rates range from 14% to 42% with these teams. He won a league Two Manager of the Year award 15 years ago but failed to attract interest from any club above League One.
But Ange too had a mixed managerial record and people pre-judged that before they saw what he did for us.
As with any new recruit, on the playing or management side, He will and should be judged on what he actually does for us not on what he promises or on anyone’s unfounded predictions of how good he will be.
I wish him well.
“setting free the bears for Res. 12 & Oscar Knox on 16th October 2024 9:32 pm
I won’t judge him on his rather unimpressive management career ( Bath, Exeter City, MK Dons, Bristol Rovers and Stevenage). ”
” rater unimpressive ” suggests you have already judged him (albeit not too strongly).
Oops ! ` rather` .