Stephen McGowan has criticised Celtic’s recent transfer activities, claiming that the club has accumulated a squad bloated by inexperienced projects.
Until this summer there was a perception around that Celtic had a slick Recruitment operation that was uncovering players off the beaten track and converting them into highly effective players and assets.
With virtually a blank canvas to work with Ange Postecoglou and Dom McKay pulled together an incredible haul of signings in the summer of 2021 which was bolstered significantly in January 2022.
The former Yokohama F Marinos boss pinpointed talent from the J-League which complimented others such as Carl Starfelt, Josip Juranovic and Giorgos Giakoumakis who were in their mid-twenties, time-served and not in the project category.
Mark Lawwell came in to head up recruitment in July 2022 with the quality and success rate taking a hit with Alistair Johnston the only nailed down starter to come in over the last three windows.
Reflecting on the defeat from Feyenoord in the Daily Mail, McGowan writes:
Given time, it’s not impossible that Lagerbielke and Holm will prove themselves to be first-team players. Like so many of the summer signings, though, they fall short of the standard required to go straight into the killing fields of the Champions League and emerge unscathed.
Of the nine summer arrivals, Lagerbielke and Honduran winger Luis Palma were the only starters in a raucous De Kuip stadium. A squad bloated with inexperienced projects, the effective hit rate of Ange Postecoglou’s first season in charge has been replaced by a scattergun approach.
From the last two transfer windows, only Johnston – Canada’s World Cup right-back – has demonstrably improved the team. A competition where only the best survive, the Champions League has never been noted for giving rookies an easy ride.
Brendan Rodgers has two matches and a full week of training to prepare his squad for the October 4 visit from Lazio.
Says it all really…We buy low…and sell big hopefully…Oh did someone say they had to be able to cope with the CL ??…Well that’s BR’s problem mate…nowt to do with me…I’ve done my job.
Said it before and I will say it again. What we needed in the summer was 2-3 really quality signings in the £5-10m transfer fee bracket plus similar types of replacements for any key players that left for big money (i.e if someone had come in for Maeda, Hatate etc, we use a big chunk of the £10-20m we would have got for them to replace them).
Instead, we have spent more or less the same amount of money buying in a much larger number of much lower quality, inexperienced, unheard of signings in the £2-5m category. The same disastrous, rinse and repeat, “buy loads of projects in cheaply and hope that 1-2 work out” “strategy” that has cost us dearly several times before.
Doing the same thing repeatedly, on the expectation that you will eventually get a different result, defines madness.
We’re also back to “we need money in the bank in case we don’t make it to the CL group stages” BS. WTF!!?? The reason why we have failed to get to the CL group stages so often is precisely BECAUSE we kept the money in the bank instead of using it to buy the sort of players that could get us there. An investment that would have paid for itself almost instantly, by guaranteeing us CL group stage payouts, and also set us up better to win domestic titles to get us back in there the next season. Failing to prepare means preparing to fail and boy does Lawell know how to do that.
Most of those players that we are calling nailed down starters were described as projects when they came. Nobody gets to nail down a starter place by virtue of transfer fee, age or physical size- you do it by consistent performance. And 4 league games into a season is to early to write off or write on any player.
Carl Starfelt, now lauded, was behind the failure Helander in the Swedish National team pecking order. He looked awkward and most of us were not convinced- Jenz played most of the CL games- but Carl eventually turned our opinions round. Leil Abada was another who looked out of his depth with poor ball control- but then he couldn’t stop scoring- and his goals trumped our pre-judgement. Liam Scales was a write off- we were on the verge of sending him to Aberdeen- but he was the best player at Ibrox and in Rotterdam. Matt O’Riley was a sand dancer- but again has blossomed and shown grit. Rio Hatate had no great rep and was a clear project but he hit the ground running until he got injured or took the huff at a transfer snub this season.
Point is- some of those players we are writing off- are going to be players we are praising and we are going to be moaning about them when they move on. Which of Yang, Palma, Lagerbielke, Nawrocki, Tillio, Holm, Kwon, or Iwata will make the greatest progress is guesswork at present but the team in Rotterdam were not all inexperienced first timers. We had a core of Hart, Johnston, Taylor, O’Riley, McGregor, Hatate, Maeda and Kyogo back for their second go, at least. How many did Feyenoord have?
Give it time and you might be proven right about the recruitment…. but, at the moment this is a hasty prejudgement.
I can’t disagree with the premise of Mr. McGowan but let’s have a reality check: the transfer window is closed and there’ll be no Eusebio or Beckenbauer descending from the heavens. The CL is is a learning curve for these players under a new manager, that’s the only way to gain experience. We’ll be going with what we’ve got and lessons will be learned.
If all we can hope for is full commitment, then let’s see what Celtic can do with full backing at Celtic Park.
Editor: With the same Head of Recruitment and the same ‘strategy’ it will be more of the same in January and again next summer. Not looking for Eusabio or Beckenbaur but a CCV or Jota would be useful rather than Korean and Australian projects that will never see the light of day.
I’m in the same boat as yourself John S in that this guy McGowan assessed this perfectly…
I think that I read on here that he’s a journalist of sorts and it’s not often that I agree with any of that mob but credit where it’s due he’s 100% plus correct with his assessment on this occasion –
And Editor’s reply…
Brendan has now spoken – concisely but firmly enough…
If there’s a repeat of this summer in January and Close Season 2024 Brendan will walk (and rightly so) and the consequences for the board will be pretty bloody dire and rightfully so !
He’s right! Where is the experience in the team?
I’d put money on junior being as useless as his father. What the greedy Irish fella needs to understand is that Celtic and his beloved huns will never be invited to join another league. His dream of making a big fat profit on his shares will die with him.
He and his useless accountant need to get their heads round that.
I think Rodgets was too quick in allowing Starfelt to leave.The problem left back slot was never addressed and there is a lack of height in that area.Too much emphasis on future prospects 1 or 2 but far to many. Why are we signing players that are injured? viz Tillio and Phillip’s. Manager still to prove himself