What a weekend of misery it was in the land of Celtic.
As if the 0-0 draw with Motherwell wasn’t bad enough, the loan Celts and former Celts were having just as miserable a time of it with the honourable exception of Malky Mackay with Watford winning away at Middlesboro (5/1 on some coupons).
Across the board it was misery all the way with Darren O’Dea a first half substitute in Reading’s 3-1 defeat at West Brom and Cillian Sheridan playing the second half in Plymouth’s 2-0 defeat at Blackpool.
On and on the defeats went, Swindon, including Simon Ferry and Ben Hutchison lost 2-0 at home to Hartlepool, Ujpest Dozsa lost 2-0 away to Kaposvar to and even Chris Sutton’s 100% record in management went up in smoke with Lincoln losing at Northampton!
In management Davie Moyes and Mick McCarthy shared a draw between Everton and Wolves, Roy Keane’s Ipswich drew at home with Swansea leaving Malky’s Hornets as the only Celts with a weekend win thanks to Tom Cleverley’s goal at Middlesboro.
To put a tin lid on things Paul Lambert’s Norwich lost a late goal at Leeds on Monday night to go down to a 2-1 defeat.
Things don’t stand still for long in football, especially in The Championship where each team has 46 fixtures to get through to chase a place in the Premiership, or more games if you take the play-off route.
Portman Road Ipswich looks like the pick of tonight’s matches with Celtic links with Watford travelling to face bottom of the table Ipswich with Roy Keane chasing his first league win of the season.
Watford are neatly tucked into mid-table with the win at Middlesboro especially welcome after back-to-back home defeats.
As a former Norwich skipper Mackay will be in for a tough time of it at Ipswich but after more than a decade in the division the former Celtic defender will know what’s in store.
Looking towards the Ipswich match he said: “I don’t think I’ve ever been to Ipswich in the whole of my playing and managerial career and had an easy game, so I don’t expect anything other than a really tough tie tomorrow night.
“I think the resilience the team showed against Middlesbrough and the courage they had to get the ball down and play really showed a growth in the group, which I was really happy about.
“Obviously to get the result means a lot to us, as it does to the little band of travelling fans who made the long and winding road up to Middlesbrough as well.
“Again at Ipswich we are playing against a team who have managed to spend some money in the summer and bring in some quality players with a new manager at the helm, there are different pressures there for us and we know it’s going to be difficult. “
Elswhere in the Championship Reading head to QPR while Plymouth have as close as they are likely to get to a derby when they make the trip to Bristol City which could see Cillian Sheridan lining up against Paul Hartley and one of his Motherwell team-mates from last season, David Clarkson.
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