Scott Brown has criticised fans that think that Celtic could be better run!
As a player and captain Brown was exceptional. The driving force behind four successive trebles, the most dominant period in Scottish football history.
Unfortunately spending 14 years inside a club can blind you to the multiple failings obvious to others on the outside looking in.
Brown never played in a Celtic side that has won a UEFA knock-out tie. That record was in place before he arrived from Hibs in 2007. It is still running five years after he left.
Celtic fans want to see their club perform to their potential in European football. They fail miserably.
There has been one decent season in Europe over the last dozen years.
Presented with a route to the Champions League Celtic have succeeded twice in their last nine attempts.
BROWN IS OFF TARGET WITH WHAT CELTIC FANS ASPIRE TO
Barely any Celtic fan wants the club to spend £20m on a player.
They do want to see the club win nine out of 10 ties against Maribor, Malmo, AEK Athens, Cluj, Ferencvaros, Midtjylland and Kairat Almaty.
Brown is a long term friend of Keith Jackson, it dates back to his time at Hibs when Willie McKay was his agent. John Collins knows the story.
The Daily Record reports Brown saying:
If they go and win this league after all the pressure and all of the criticism of the board, the players and managers coming in and leaving, it will be the best league win ever.
There are a lot of vultures out there on social media and podcasts who think they know how to run the club better. It’s as if people think Celtic can just go out and spend £20m on a player because the money is in the bank.
But if you do that and then you don’t make the Champions League then what happens? The club starts going into the red.
Absolutely no-one is calling on Celtic to spend £20m on one player.
They did spend £10m last summer on two left-wingers who have contributed virtually nothing.
Michel Ange Balikwisha hasn’t been seen since an anonymous performance against Auchinleck Talbot in January.
Sebastian Tounekti has been slightly better, starting 15 out of 33 SPFL matches.
Realising that those signings had failed to deliver Celtic went back into the market in January.
All of the data and recruitment expertise identified Joel Mvuka as the man to provide the goals and assists missing since peak Jota and Liel Abada.
Fortunately Celtic belatedly detected a heart problem in Mvuka. Instead of £3m washed down the drain and a four year contract he is only on loan.
Mvuka has made two appearances, both in the Scottish Cup totalling 86 minutes.
Since selling Jota for £25m Celtic have frittered that fee away on Luis Palma, Marco Tilio, Yang Hyun-jun, Balikwisha and Tounekti.
On his day Yang has been competent. The other four are miles short of what is required to be a Celtic winger.
The money being washed away every week on wages for those four is terrifying.
Tilio quietly departed for Rapid Vienna where he barely plays.
CELTIC AND THE WASTED MILLIONS
Other write-offs in the recent past include Albian Ajeti, Vasilis Barkas and Boli Bolingoli. All signed to play alongside Brown and contributing next to nothing.
You can also throw in the January 2019 signings Vakoun Bayo and Marian Shved. A year later Celtic signed Patryk Klimala and Ismail Soro.
Constantly the club throws money away of hopeful punts that have a 1 in 10 chance of succeeding.
Ange Postecoglou and Frank Trimboli delivered two highly successful transfer windows before Mark Lawwell was inserted into the equation.
After that Rodgers gained control signing Adam Idah, Nicolas Kuhn, Arne Engels and Auston Trusty.
As reward for that Celtic sold Kyogo Furuhashi and signed Shin Yamada.
The same CEO signed off on Wilfried Nancy, Paul Tisdale and Mark Lawwell.
Nicholson has delivered two one to one interviews in almost five years as CEO, both with Gerry McCulloch on Celtic TV.
Literally the only non-moneyball, non-data driven signings that were any good at all were Ange’s.
Was that the last time a manager was allowed free reign away from the model?
Also, we all know why Ange was allowed to do this….look at the fees paid.
It’s all about the bottom line, even if these signings are failures, as long as that bank balance doesn’t drop below a predetermined ceiling, the suits have done their job.
Notice all these COLLOSAL wages and fees went on foreign duds…
Maybe we should’ve signed an odd Shankland along the way !