Liam Scales said that Thursday’s win over Portugal was his “best night in an Ireland shirt”. A lot has happened since. A win over Portugal in Dublin, aided by a Scales assist, turned out to be a preliminary for the 95th minutes winner the Celtic defender setup for Troy Parrot in Budapest yesterday. That result put Ireland into the World Cup qualification playoffs at the expense of hosts Hungary.
With the likes of Italy (and maybe Denmark) waiting in the playoffs there is still a lot to do before Ireland reach the World Cup proper but their winners stepped up when needed. A new generation of Irish football heroes has been minted this week and while Troy Parrot takes the podium, Liam’s contribution has been iconic.
Two years ago Liam was on his way back out the door on loan to Aberdeen. Injuries meant he was retained and he has since developed into one of the best defenders in the league, won Man of a Match award in the Champions League and a player who is excelling on the international stage. This is our model. Identify and develop players with potential. We have no other credible option.
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I am sure Dermot paid the one millon quid loan fee and 65,000 weekly wage for Robbie Keane.
Quick and easy from GrandOldTeam
£31m paid in for various share issues – £7m paid out in dividends (cant say this is “taking it” from the club, it was just a clever manouvere to get a return.
https://x.com/JBLuvsCeltic/status/1954645749121401074/photo/1
PETETHEBEAT on 17TH NOVEMBER 2025 2:30 PM
For anyone who has Amazon Prime, the Kenny Dalglish film is a good watch.
He was pretty respectful about his time at Celtic and my impression was that he made up his mind to leave after the Atletico Madrid games in 1974, when he maybe thought the team weren’t quite good enough to be winners again.
However, he had such respect for Jock Stein that he felt he couldn’t depart after the accident in 1975 and stuck it out until after the 19777 double.
The Big Man took it fine, facilitating the move as well.
……………………..
There was a lot more to Kenny’s departure than you say, trust me.
ps –
important to note – His £31m investment is now worth over £100m at current market price.
It would take a billionare to buy out the now TRIPLE BILLIONAIRE.
he and his placement are going nowhere until he decides himself, there imho will be no personnel announcements at the agm.
St Stivs,
Good stuff.
Your link highlights the fact that the preference shares dividend never increases – and that is baked in.
In fact, Celtic will be paying less overall in dividends than when first floated by Fergus given that some preference shares will have been converted to ordinary shares or dividends used to buy ordinary shares or dividends never cashed.
DD no doubt has many faults – but he certainly isn’t using Celtic as a personal cash cow.
SS
So was the 31 m you mention used to payback the bank but in return he increased his shareholding? I remeber being asked to agree that as he was reaching the level where he would need to make an offer for all the shares, that this was waived by the shareholders who held these. For me any money he has put in has bought him shares, nothing wrong with owning the shares but is this really the way he wants to run Celtic?
Tim Malone @ 4:29 pm,
No, Bigbhoy is absolutley on the money.
Dermot Desomond put money i to build the new stadium.
Which we should be eterbally greatful for that.
He makes a lot of money out of dividends on those shares.
Celtic have many benefits includung making amount of money of the stadium rebuild.
Fair dos…
The subsequent share issue and the build of the Tommy Burns elite academy was a ruse…
It gave Dermot Desmond shares for underwriting the share issue which took him over a threshold FMcC stated would never be broken.
To my way of thinking, that share issue was well dodgey…
The way he manipulates the hand picked pusillanimous Board members…
Hail Hail
Saint Stivs @ 4:40 pm,
Rubbish!?
Where is the cash?
The Celtic support paid down the debt
Hail Hail
Don’t~Believe~The~Hype
The Celtic Support Provide The Money
Without which the freeloaders would be gone….
Hail Hail
Bhoyjoebelfast @ 4:43 pm,
Did he ever get paid back?
Hail Hail
Chairbhoy,
He is a billionaire – if you bother to take a look at the St Stivs link you will see he makes about £178k per annum in dividends – a lot of money to us but chump change to him.
For sure he has defacto control of the club and his asset has significantly grown – but a total of £3million in dividends payments over 20 odd years for £31 million invested is certainly not a big return.
I am not defending his business practices in any way – and I don’t know what his motivation is – but he is most definitely not using Celtic to drain off cash.
MON and Maloney to stay in charge until further notice
Tim Malone Will Tell on 17th November 2025 5:08 pm
Chairbhoy,
He is a billionaire – if you bother to take a look at the St Stivs link you will see he makes about £178k per annum in dividends – a lot of money to us but chump change to him
——————–
Just a point of correction.
Originally the dividends were 3.6p a share. It is now 6p.
I got banned from KDS, Videocelts, ReadCeltic and JF blog for pointing the actual financial history of this, and it is inteprettud as board supporting, I am not, I am just poining out the actual facts.
Due diligence if you like, btwe dividends payout is in the annual report.
14 DIVIDEND ON CONVERTIBLE CUMULATIVE PREFERENCE SHARES
A 6% non-equity dividend of £0.52m (2024: £0.53m) was paid on 29 August 2025 to those holders of Convertible Cumulative Preference Shares on the
share register at 25 July 2025. A number of shareholders elected to participate in the Company’s scrip dividend reinvestment scheme for the financial year
to 30 June 2025. Those shareholders have received new Ordinary Shares in lieu of cash. No dividends were payable or proposed to be payable on the
Company’s Ordinary Shares.
Tim Malone 5.08
Well said .
TT
Motherwell get alcohol licence
Brendan brought in Idah to replace Kyogo who wanted to leave. Kyogo cost little Idah cost heaps. Maeda wanted the centre forward position to prove himself for the national team and to get his move to a big league. He wasn’t allowed to leave and has downed tools until he can. Neither Khun or Kyogo are shining post Celtic. The board did an incredible job getting that money, which Brendan spent. Yes we need to rinse and repeat, new player with potential and develop along with the odd ready made player. Chairbhoy I’ve heard the board talk about their love for Celtic. You on the other hand just constantly moan about the club along with the other malcontents. Misery loves company. The suits will give the new manager cash to splash over the next two windows and we will have a new exciting team to watch. The Glasgow Celtic will be there. Hail hail
PETETHEBEAT on 17TH NOVEMBER 2025 2:30 PM
For anyone who has Amazon Prime, the Kenny Dalglish film is a good watch.
———-
Agreed.
Kenny was my first and is still one of my great Celtic heroes but the footage of how he handled Hillsborough , and the degree to which it affected him , only increased my respect for him. Marina also comes out of that horrible time with huge credit.
CHAIRBHOY @ 5:03
According to newspaper reports back then DD paid the loan fee and wages out of his ‘pocket’,so I would imagine getting ‘ paid back’ would have made the ‘ paid fee and wages from DD,untrue.
St Stivs,
Just checked with our new chum ChatGPT.
Celtic paid out £599k in dividends in 2000 reducing to £520k in 2025.
Some of those dividends may not have been cashed or may have been used to purchase ordinary shares (these pay no dividends but do have voting rights).
Regardless of any personal opinions on the plc, the dividend is not massively significant and is shrinking over time.
What is the Starz on 17th November 2025 4:38 pm
____
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2025/nov/17/it-touched-us-from-the-start-palestine-savour-historic-night-in-bilbao
……..
Pep Guardiola is managing a Barcelona side against Palestine in the Nou Camp the morra night I think?!
Well done.
HH
oot.
Chairbhoy
You are a Chilterns rascal and vagabond.
That’s you telt. 🧐
Wits good to see you on these pages,well done on you and jim are keeping up embassy watch.
Ps. Peter says hi
:-)
HH
An Tearmann
It was a great night,The Basque Country solidarity with Palestine is phenomenal
Who originally leaked that Wilfred Nancy was our target?
Is it just speculation that he is our MAIN target ?
Interviewing someone does not mean that you are going to offer them the job.
There could be a twist in the story yet.
MON means that we can take our time .
We should not rush this decision .
TT
The Board need MON at the AGM,to take some heat off them
WITS- In the pub,and a feature on Athletic Bilbao just came on TNT 1
Something must have happened during final discussions, assuming Nancy deal got to that stage, or a new name entered frame. Either way, it is becoming a bit of a circus…..can’t conclude a deal for players during transfer windows and same now with a manager. They’ve had enough time since BR was binned!
KB- Looks like he’s looked under the hood,and said no thanks,zero structure, and Desmond’s statement will scare a lot of guys off
BB – it’s a bit of a worry but hopefully it gets sorted soon 🙏 🙏
Bigrailroadblues @ 5:47 pm;
Am’ a rambler, am’ a gambler, am’ a long way from home…
But comin’ back to sort the rest oot very soon
Hail Hail
TBB
Of course it will, you can fire as much money as you want at someone to take a job, but, it will change nothing, Celtic FC needs to be the number 1 priority of the plc, then put the structures in place to help the Football Club work effectively, don’t do that we are in the same cycle of winning loads at home[maybe in the future] but failing to make a consistent or any impact in Europe. I don’t think we have heard the last from those recently resigned or sacked employees, we seem to be a complete shambles,this is tragic and self inflicted.
Chairboy
You really are embarrassing yourself today.
.
It is clear who invested what and when.
After the final funding round DD and CT pulled down the shutters. They could see a car crash of Murray proportions of things continued. BQ PL and living within our means was the thing. It still is.
I wasn’t a fan initially either. As main sponsors I felt it may restrict our potential. I was wrong.
We survived and the govan lot didn’t.
No one is taking undue fortunes from Celtic for their trouble.
For 20 years or so your bitterness and resentment has oozed from every post anti board etc etc.
Chill. We have in those 20 years won more as a club than in any other 20 year period.
Maybe just suck it up.
Funny how the same folk who were slaughtering Nancy earlier and saying he was a cheap board option now saying he doesn’t fancy us and it’s down to DD comments about BR.
Back in the day we used to have the MSM trying to bring us down. Now we have greedy leeches purporting to be Celtic bloggers making money from anti Celtic diatribes and shite.
If Nancy is the frontrunner and not willing to make a quick decision then that potentially is a good thing. Hopefully it means he is negotiating hard for the things that are important to him. If the board cannot or will not meet his demands then who could blame him if he says no?
If the likes of Hayen, Knutsen, McKenna and others have also been considered and no progress made since BR’s departure, what does it tell us?
One thing looks certain, despite wanting BR out the door, the board had no contingency plan to replace him.
Unless you believe it is Maloney
So it looks like we’re toiling to land a manager.
Strange that…
Ye, Desmond is great…..
Here comes ‘ be careful what you wish for,and the Board propaganda line that the cardboard cutout Nicholson came away with a couple of weeks ago- we don’t want to end up like the huns,total shite
“Burnley78 on 17th November 2025 6:49 pm
Back in the day we used to have the MSM trying to bring us down. Now we have greedy leeches purporting to be Celtic bloggers making money from anti Celtic diatribes and shite.”
The only bit I would disagree with is the `back in the day` comment which suggests the MSM no longer attempt to bring us down.