Where to start? It has been a bad week of football for the Bhoys. Two defeats and a toothless draw. Fans who only a week ago were thinking we would skate the league are now turning on the manager. Some even calling for him to walk.
I myself am disappointed, we should have been more prepared for Europe after last year. Too be fair though, FC Sion are a better team than most Celtic fans give them credit. The Swiss league is on the up with a string of great European results over the last couple of years from a number of different teams. Still, it was a game I thought we would win. So why didn’t we?
Well there are a few things we could look at. Tactics were wrong in both games and we also had injuries to a few key players. These definitely factored but I thing there is a another more important reason that we have struggled over the last three years.
Lack of competition. I would like to ask a question of all the lads that thought we would stroll this game. What was that based on? The fact that we beat Hearts three times last year? Or the hammerings we handed out to Aberdeen? When was the last time a team outside of Glasgow did anything in Europe?
We finished 29 points ahead of Hearts last year. That is huge. That is how far the Old Firm is ahead of the rest of Scotland. We are only guaranteed four competitive domestic games every year.
How is a team supposed to improve when outside of Rangers every club they play against parks the bus home and away and pray they get a draw? Then we play away from home in Europe and we have a decent team attack us, our defence falls apart.
I don’t even blame Daniel Majstorovic, he looked genuinely surprised they attacked within 60 seconds. I think what this has shown is that the standard of the SPL is drastically dropping and something has to be done about it.
As the old saying goes, “You’re only as good as your company you keep.”
What changes would you implement to improve standard of the SPL?
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We’re operating at the level the board want. No financial input into the team no ambition.
We have a history of no investment when we really should. Let’s not forget we’re a rich club in football terms.
Can we stop blaming the lack of competition in the SPL for our Euro failures.
We’ve struggled and lost points against the SPL minnows for the past few years, St Mirren & ICT being particular lows and thats without mentioning Ross County.
We are not good enough, we pay over the odds for very very average players, our Captain is the worst “Footballer” to hold that post in our history!
No Excuses!!!!
Total mince, enough is enough time for action, Neil Lennon record in Europe is quite simply a joke, but it aint funny, wrestled with this but only for a short time, time to go, been at the helm long enough and things are still a joke, and by the way take 3/4 of the playing staff with you, imposters.
Absolute trash. The Norwegians, Belgians, Swedes, Armenians,Ukrainians – almost everycountry in Europe syas the same thing about their domestic football. I almost all of the above cases Celtic pays more in a weekly wage bill than the entire league’s weekly wage bill (Norway, Sweden). 60 thousand plus people at a home game and a global support of millions (yes millions), lucrative summer tours and internationals from every continent. Can’t really say that about the Norwegians can you ?
It is not the lack of progression it is the poor, uninspired and lack of creativity that we witness. Under NL we have been like this every second game and often for streteches of 3, 4, 5 games. He cant pull players in the transfer market, he values players that, frankly, would not be training with the first team in any other similar sized club.
– What is Stokes doing out on the sideline every game
– What is Smaras doing even playing if he hasn’t scored for 8 months
– Why does Frazer Forster punch the ball out so often when he is the tallest player on the field
– Why is Scott Brown the captain – why is he even playing
– Why do we change the lineup every week – injuries aside – the team has never been settled
– Why did Commons come back from the summer looking and running like he had holidayed at Gregg’s bakeries – why after 6 – 8 weeks of first team football and training is he still so unfit
– Why do we never score from a corner kick
– Why the 5 – 10 minutes for McCourt every week
And last of all – why the comments to the BBC last night. Your team was beaten before the game started.
You’ll have to go Neil – take some of yur signings with you and take our love with you but you will have to go.
Load of guff if you ask me. League competition really has nothing to do with it. We were destroying SPL dross with the likes of Larsson, sutton, Lubo, hartson, petrov,Thompson etc. And they still became a true European force that teams across the continent feared. It’s all about finances, you get what you pay for, and we paid a fortune to get those players here and they delivered success, now we are filled with SPL, championship, or EPL reserve players. With that kind of squad, what do we expect from them in Europe? So what can be done about it? Not much. Not as long as we continue to suffocate with such poor finances in the SPL. Is it fair? No. Is there something we can really do about it? At the moment, no.
this article is mince!! the reason we are pish is not because of the other teams in the spl, it is because the board could not give a fuck about on field performances.
they arte blinkered and only see dividends and balance sheets, it time foe celtic fans to act and get rid of them!!!