Jackson kicks off 2024 with fresh attack on those nasty entitled Celtic fans
Soccer Football - Scottish Premiership - Celtic v Livingston - Celtic Park, Glasgow, Scotland, Britain - December 21, 2022 Celtic fans inside the stadium before the match REUTERS/Russell Cheyne
Keith Jackson has started 2024 by returning to a favoured theme- criticising entitled Celtic supporters.
The veteran Daily Record reporter first used the phrase in November 2020 when he passed on the thoughts of a source close to Dermot Desmond after fans protested following the home defeat in the League Cup to Ross County.
The connotation of entitled was that Season Ticket holders of the biggest club in the country should meekly accept four successive home defeats and trust the manager appointed in the Hampden showers to turn Vasilas Barkas, Albian Ajeti, Diego Laxalt and Shane Duffy into competent players to match the side from Dingwall.
Celtic fans had first raised the alarm when Neil Lennon followed up losing to Cluj in a Champions League qualifier by losing at home to Ferencvaros a year later. Afterwards the manager condemned the entire squad by claiming that he was working with some players that didn’t want to be there.
Angry supporters wanted better, they weren’t convinced by the manager, the CEO or the bulk of the players. When Celtic started the 21/22 season Lennon and Lawwell were no longer on the payroll, most of the squad had moved on with Dom Mackay overseeing the most successful transfer window this century.
That is the levels that those nasty entitled supporters aspire to, not watching undercooked projects toiling, bringing down established winners with players unable to do the basics while defending set pieces.
In the Record today, Jackson shares his thinking:
It was only a couple of weeks ago, after all, that the most entitled element at the core of this club was threatening to turn full scale against the manager, while posturing mutinously towards the directors box at the same time. Sack the board. Sack the boss. In the furious aftermath of that home defeat to Hearts on December 16 they would have chased Hoopy the Huddle Hound down London Road so utterly consumed had they become with a sense of eye popping panic at the very thought of failing to win a 13th title in 14 years.
So Saturday’s blood and thunder victory over the nearest and dearest will at least have added a bit of calm to the situation and maybe even provided a moment to pause and reflect on the ridiculous nature of this overreaction.
There was no chant of Sack The Boss, there was however a very personalised chant aimed at the Celtic Chairman who stepped away long enough for his son to be appointed Head of Scouting and First Team Recruitment before officially taking over as Chairman one year ago today.
Lawwell missed the Hearts match while he enjoyed a holiday in Portugal, unlike in the previous two January transfer windows there are no Celtic signings being confirmed today. When Rodgers returned in June he told Marky that four quality additions were required- before losing Jota, Aaron Mooy and Carl Starfelt.
In June 2020 Lawwell gave his last ever newspaper interview to Jackson, explaining his plan to have supporters inside Celtic Park for test matches before the SPFL season started. It was a year before fans returned, just 24,000 were allowed to watch the first home match of the 21/22 season against Dundee.
When Lawwell was overcome by grief at the news of Walter Smith’s death in October 2022 he was on the phone to his pal at the Daily Record to record his sadness at the news.
Celtic last won a European knock-out tie in March 2004, six months after Lawwell was appointed as CEO on a salary of £166,000 pa. In the last decade they have lost to Maribor, Malmo, AEK Athens, Cluj, Ferencvaros and Midtjylland in Champions League qualifiers with each defeat costing around £20m in turnover
After losing to AEK Athens in August 2018 Lawwell finished the year with a salary and bonus of £3,549,026 on a turnover of £83.4m, down from the previous year turnover of £101.6m.
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