Davie Provan has taken the Celtic board to task over the club’s demise in Europe.
Soon after being knocked out of the Champions League by Ferencvaros Dermot Desmond claimed that the current squad is superior to the side that reached the UEFA Cup Final in Seville.
That sounded like a comforting sound-bite on the back of a bad result but since Desmond barely gives one interview a year it was a source for concern. In the same interview it was suggested that a sports psychologist would help the players after three successive failures to reach even the Play Off stage of the Champions League against unseeded opponents.
Despite the ‘better than Seville’ claim Celtic have stumbled through the season to date, losing three key home matches with key areas of the team still to settle.
Despite winning the last 11 domestic trophies there is a look of uncertainty over the club at the moment, in The Sun, Provan writes:
Why have Rangers, after liquidation and four years in the lower leagues, been allowed to close the gap? What’s the point of parading the balance sheet every year if you don’t use that wealth to crush the opposition?
Lawwell and his board have allowed Rangers back into the game when the Ibrox club should be a speck in the rear-view mirror. Equally unforgiveable has been the demise of Celtic in European competition.
Recently, Dermot Desmond claimed the current team would beat the O’Neill team that ran Porto close in Seville. God help the club if he was being serious.
Either way, Celtic should be beating clubs like Ferencvaros, Cluj, AEK Athens, Malmo and Legia Warsaw. How many Champions League millions have been lost losing to clubs with a fraction of Celts’ resources?
But the pursuit of The Ten has blindsided punters to European failure. Offered the choice, some would take this season’s Premiership title ahead of a Champions League win.
Within a week of losing to Ferencvaros Celtic signed David Turnbull and Shane Duffy.
