14th April 2019, Hampden Park, Glasgow, Scotland; Scottish Cup football, semi final, Aberdeen versus Celtic; Celtic Caretaker Manager Neil Lennon shakes hands with Celtic CEO Peter Lawwell
Stephen McGowan has delivered an ‘insightful attack’ on the Celtic Trust.
He specifically names Jeanette Findlay as he harks back to the pathetic Celtic AGM of 2025 without naming the man that Chaired the meeting.
It was of course former Chairman Peter Lawwell.
Writing in The Herald McGowan brings together all of the problems currently facing Celtic, focussing on Martin O’Neill at the centre of the storm.
Dermot and Ross Desmond get mentions, as does Celtic’s horrific record in European competitions, Seville gets a call out as does Manchester City but one name is noticeably absent.
Chairman Lawwell did of course spend 17 years as CEO of Celtic.
No one has had a greater influence on the current position of the club than Lawwell who spent three years as Chairman before bailing out.
Among his last public comments to supporters was yelling BEHAVE.
That worked well for two two decades with messengers, it didn’t go down quite so well with shareholders and supporters at large.
Discussing the influence of Desmond Senior in today’s ‘thought piece’ in the Herald McGowan claims:
Shareholders and supporters would welcome the chance to query why a non-executive director can utilise the club website to fire out personal statements at some stage, but the last time the Kaiser of Parkhead subjected himself to the indignity of answering any questions at a Celtic AGM was 2006.
His son, Ross, is not a director of the club, but acts as a proxy for his father, delivering a statement which went down like a bucket of cold sick at last November’s annual meeting.
There were no awkward questions from the floor then, either, because the whole gathering was brought to a hasty and farcical end by the performative student-union grandstanding of the Celtic Trust and a board of directors a little too eager to pull the plug from the wall.
A date for this year’s gathering of shareholders has yet to be announced. Directors, you suspect, would jump at the chance to convene an online meeting behind closed doors rather than run the gamut of their own shareholders.
Or go another ten rounds with Jeanette Findlay and her band of wounded brothers as they demand an apology over recent slights.
It wasn’t the board of directors that were a little too eager to pull the plug from the wall.
Chairman Lawwell did that, the clue is in his title. He Chairs the AGM.
CELTIC GET THEIR MESSAGE OUT
He loved throwing about personal digs and of course some thigh slapping jibes about his O** F*** partners at Ibrox.
Remember the hilarious ‘Rory Bremner can pretend he is Tony Blair’ side splitter when asked about the 2012 Ibrox Tribute Act.
In 2024 there was the fantastic gag about ‘the last time they conceded a penalty was when John Greig was playing’.
That came after his chosen successor Michael Nicholson replied ‘penalty to Rangers’ when asked a detailed question about John Beaton.
Oh how they laughed.
But don’t dare try scrutiny, detail or facts. Oh no.
For McGowan it seems like the Celtic Trust are the problem. Student politics and wounded brothers.
There most certainly are wounded brothers around at the moment.
Their leading light bolted a few weeks after he abandoned the AGM and hasn’t been seen since in the Directors Box at Celtic Park.
There are lost souls everywhere out there with nowhere to turn as the complacency, cronyism and nepotism stored up down the years threaten to engulf ‘the best run club in European football’.
Jeanette findlay gave lawwell an excuse to close the meeting. She played it badly. I am no fan of the Board.
Editor: First time comment, how strange. Why not comment on the pathetic Chairman unable to hold an AGM, screaming behave, ending it in under an hour then bailing out?
They’ll just try it online this time as they are cowards !
Lawwell acted disgracefully at last seasons AGM how dare he speaks to shareholders like that treating them like school children, he obviously forgot the people he was talking down to was paying for his heated driveway and high standard of living and made him a very rich man…..my only regret was nobody has ever stuck his OF brand and 4 way agreement up his jacksie,
Jeanette Findlay through the Celtic Trust has been one of the only people who tried to do the job of Wilson, Desmond and the other NEDs on the board by asking the awkward questions, and putting forward proposals that would improve the governance of Celtic. If McGowan and his cronies admitted that and do their jobs properly then their rags may not be going down the tubes. In my opinion Jeanette Findlay would make an excellent replacement for Wilson.