26th April 2025; Tannadice Park, Dundee, Scotland; Scottish Premiership Football, Dundee United versus Celtic;
Celtic Supporters Limited published a brutal reaction to Celtic’s defeat to Benfica.
While Martin O’Neill took positives from the second half display it is hard to get away from the final scoreline. Or Celtic sitting third bottom of the Europa League table.
By most metrics Celtic should be comparable with Benfica.
Broadcasting deals mean that Celtic start each season £100m down on Bournemouth, Sunderland and Crystal Palace but there are other Europa League sides that fair comparisons can be made with.
Benfica are outside the big five leagues and border with a very wealthy neighbour. Just like Celtic are with the EPL.
Of course there will be differences in circumstances, Portugal is in the European Union and has an easier passage to players from Brazil.
Nothing is like for like but on and off the park there was a stark contrast between last night’s opponents.
@SLBenfica 4 @CelticFC 1.
This isn’t about one bad night in Lisbon. Benfica are in our Celtic Paradox paper for a reason: a club owned by its members, close to 300,000 of them, that turns its academy into first-team players and transfer income year after year, and plans to compete in Europe every season.
A balance sheet is a means, not a trophy. Celtic’s board has turned a football club into a savings account: £66.4m in the bank at 30 June, revenue down 22.7%, and no published plan for what the money is for.
Yes, £31.6m went on signings this summer. Spending isn’t a plan. A plan tells the owners what the money should achieve and how they’ll know if it worked. Celtic publishes none of that.
No multi-year strategy with targets. No capital allocation policy. No academy plan. Not one of our twelve governance asks met at our last review.
That model is a choice. Shareholders can ask the board to make a different one.
Fans already own shares in this club. Use them at the AGM: give your proxy, come to the meeting, ask the question.
Members’ Night, Wednesday 21st October, Glasgow. Join us https://t.co/sHLeziAyli
— Celtic Supporters Ltd (@celticCSL) October 15, 2026
THE SCALE OF THE CELTIC SUPPORT
Benfica’s membership scheme gives a real life measure of the strength of their support.
Various claims have been made about the reach of the Celtic support, especially across North America and Australia. The exact scale remains unknown.
Ireland is a similar market.
There is a very active and dedicated Celtic support across Ireland but how many people would commit to a membership scheme to formalise a relationship is unknown.
The immediate issues facing the SPFL champions is on the park.
Currently the hoops are in 56th place in the UEFA Coefficient table, immediately above them are Marseille, Athletic Club Bilbao, Slavia Prague, GNK Dinamo and Midtjylland.
Next week Celta Vigo visit Glasgow with the pressure cranked up to match last season’s achievement of 11 points from eight matches and a place in the Round of 16 Play Offs.
Following the visit of Celta Celtic are at home to Beskitas ahead of the November international break.
CLICK HERE for CSL homepage.
The manager was pleased with the second half performance…., really?
The worry is that he was pleased, if that’s the case we should be worried.
MON doesn’t look in good health, for his own sake he should leave the Board to carry the can.
Why are the supporters investing in Europe, no-one else is ?