Do you feel cheated? I don’t.
So the X-Factor – thankfully – uses Auto-Tune. Jim Kerr once “promised you a miracle” and that never happened but I never had the urge put electrodes on his nipples for crimes against fashion and music. So,Peter Lawwell, seemingly, promised a Big Name (so BIG his Big Name has to be capitalised) while others know that he didn’t.
The Roadshows fired up the over active imagination of those in our support on line and standing at bus stops. Before the Number 8 bus had arrived to take them to their destination they were whispering of “broken promises”.
I attended one of those Roadshows. I read most of the transcripts from the other Roadshows. Lawwell trumpeted that he would back the manager. 11 players is testament to that statement. He was parped that warning that we could no longer compete financially. The 11 players signed is also testament to that.
Yes, it’s taking me some time to adjust to this. From the boom of the early noughties when we looked like contenders we are now back in the bust period.
A look at the squad list reminds me of the look of most teams squad lists when Murdoch’s money first arrived in Scottish football. Cheap foreign imports mixed with Scottish, British, Irish journey men.
In my more patronising moments I look and compare us to other failing British European Cup Winners Nottingham Forest or a Leeds or Sheffield Wednesday. Clubs that due to mismanagement and a changing financial tundra are now treading water at levels their history and set up’s don’t deserve.
Yes, you can feel the establishment ruffling our hair going “awwww, poor you, it will be ok…” while feasting on Tv money sponsored meat pastries, Cava and ladies of the night.
That fecking annoys. But….
Europe. That auld chestnut which has caused me endless sleepless nights and question the quality that the prefix ‘International player‘ brings. Looking back before UEFA gerrymandered European competition brings it into focus.
Apart from a few good years we have always been Luddites when faced with Europeans and their fancy ways i.e. they actually pass to each other and can run a bit quick especially on the break.
Before Vigo it had been 20 years since we had been in Europe after Santa. Since then we have tasted it 4 times. That was feast, this is famine and the natural conclusion to the cycle.
We might not like but we need to get used to it. I reserve my right to criticise any player that wears the jersey of my club that I have emotional attachment to as not being good enough.
The modern day gulf between us and them means that the feeling they care more about the wing mirror on their sports cars than the club they play for rings true. That is an idiotic feeling but one I cling to.
This emotional attachment means I won’t walk away. Those who proclaim to have had enough after Utrecth and such can contact me and, via paypal, I will pay for their taxi which will take them to Beachy Head where it will fail to stop.
Yes, I’m a glass half empty fellow and I feel that the eternal optimists are living in a world where their tea is served by mermaids with ample breasts but not remembering that supporting a team only guarantees misery, heartache and the feeling of hopelessness and giving up when you get that is a lot, lot worse.
Don’t need a Big Name. The paradox is that if we needed a Big Name to win the SPL and at least one cup this season then it’d be the wrong time for a Big Name to come in. The trophy cupboard’s bare despite the Biggest of Names coming in midway through last season.
No, Celtic have the squad now to do everything that’s still up for grabs. If we can’t do it now then we don’t deserve any Big Name even for next season. Solid and successful 10-11 gives Lenny the consistency to somehow win the two or whatever ties it’ll take us to get into the Champions League and THEN we get a Big Name and THEN we build.
One step at a time.
@Jay
Correct, we have 3 seasons of slide to rebuild. It could take at least 2 or 3 seasons before Europe is in our thoughts again.
I personally could not care less that neither Keane nor Bellamy came to the club, in that I had no expectation whatsoever that it would happen. A permanent move for such a player will just not happen. We may never spend that kind of money on a player again, at least under the current administration. A loan move is a sticky plaster and a short term fix to a long term problem. Utterly pointless. Their wage demands are ridiculous too. What sort of message does that send to the rest of the squad ? I know how I’d feel if someone doing the same job as me (putting aside comparative talent) was getting paid 2 or 3 times as much. You have to ask yourself why Keane doesn’t start at Spurs after Redknapp waxes lyrical about how hard he works in training. It’s not because Defoe and Crouch are better players ! Why did Bellamy go to Cardiff if he’s so good ? (I know family may have been a factor..my opinion, chuck enough money at a player and they’ll go anywhere..). Never mind that he’s injury prone.
I don’t know what’ll happen this season, but I’m looking forward to the Hearts game. That’s how I’m taking it, one game at a time.
@ wildrover
Bellamy went to Cardiff because Man Citeh can play god. Next season will see Bellamy move to an Epl club that Citeh don’t see as a threat.
Keane is hated by Spurs fans and O’Neill leaving Villa scuppered his dream move outworn joining Sunderireland.
He has done tour of duty. He won’t be seen again.
In a “butterfly’s wing starts a hurricane on the other side of the world” style, I still believe that our current predicament is down to Gordon Strachan’s screamingly mistaken idea that a Celtic midfield could ever be improved by putting Gary Caldwell at it’s heart.
Fuck, it still makes me mad. Just play Crosas or even Flood I scream in sweat-drenched nightmare flash-backs.
If just 2 of the many draws in 2008-09 had turned into wins, there would have been 2 years of Champions League, and posters for Zippo’s Circus stuck to the whited-out windows of Ibrox.
@pujol
I used to blame Strachan for everything. I used to point to the day he was appointed as the day the slide begun. But, time is a healer and when you see what he did in the first 3 seasons it’s a fond time but… You get away with bad management and the circumstances for only so long.
Does Zippo have a circus?
PL & NL promised players of stature and experience not nessecarily a big name. I was at Dub Q&A, I’m not stupid and know exactly what I heard. A loan player me be a sticky plaster but if 2 good sticky plasters buried the huns this season then you can build from there.
Yes I do feel cheated as what WAS promised when I was in attendance wasn’t delivered. I find it rather insulting that someone should suggest I was wrong in what I heard. I could produce enough soundbites and quotes from NL to support this!
@ Harper
The experience and stature was promised and not delivered. I said as much last week. We got our bloody noses very much in public with that. I was getting at, once again, those who thought those meetings promised a big name I know you didn’t.
Your comment backs that up.
Right, got that off my chest.
You’re absolutely right, the spells from 67-74 and 01-07 are the actual blips in our European record, when being a supporter was easy and even tinged with a bit of glamour.
Those of us who’ll be there on Saturday know what it’s really about. What kind of fud gives up because we aren’t reigning champions, or because none of our 11 signings have ever been interviewed by Garth Crooks? Then those self same fuds have the cheek to claim some kind of moral high-ground, telling the rest of us we have been duped by the board, and likening themselves to “Celts for Change”.
Ranting again…
@pujol
Heh I said to a young pup after Ross County last year who started going in 2001 that days like these are normal the last 10 years have been the blip.
For not being interviewed by Garth Crooks is a good thing. He is a knobhead.
According to google, the orange-wigged provo has TWO circuses on the go at the same time.
Aye, WGS was a breath of fresh air for his first couple of years, but the pain of 2009 makes it difficult to remember clearly.
Garth Crooks, the English Craig Patterson…
Nothing wrong with a moan – all things in moderation. The board have messed up a lot in the last few years and need a toe in the baws now and again, but the idea that they are ripping us off like the Kellys and Whites is just easily proved as nonsense.
Could be worse he could be the English John Robertson.
The boards overally cautious approach has lead to mismanagement.
@pujol
the board are at fault for an obsession with downsizing. downsizing which means that the product on display is getting worse or if you like is of a poorer quality. paying the same money for a inferior product= really getting ripped off!!
Could people please stop comparing Celtic Football Club to the likes of Forest and Leeds. Whether those have underachieved or overachieved at various points in their histories is down to factors within their control. Celtic are a club with millions of fans worldwide who are held back – rightly or wrongly – by the misfortune of residing in Scotland.
I talk about steady growth but even then we’d be better off starting that growth pattern in The Championship or, preferably, a mediocre European league such as the Atlantic League.
Interesting point Jay 12.18. I wonder how Celtic would be different in culture, success and in fanbase if they had been based in Ireland or England?
@jebus
downsizing and being ripped off are two different things.
you don’t notice that you are being ripped off but downsizing is noticeable and accountable.
@Jay
I was commenting on the patronising way Derby v Leeds was described on the Tv the other week. Notts Forest always get describe in whimsical tones that really should be scored to a grim northern sounding orchestral soundtrack.
I imagine that this is how we are described at UEFA – Platini and Taylor holding court by the water cooler talking about us before discussing the porn they watched the night before – if they actually gave a rats shit about us.
Celtic have failed also and this has been down to factors within their control.
We should be in the Champions League. Only one set of folk to blame that we are not.
Oh when we look back on the past couple of years we’ll see two of the worst R*ngers squads in history so can’t argue with your final points.
But when we talk about attracting big players and adding to our history of European glory nights, that needs to be powered by the bread and butter which south of the border is preferable to our own. That said, like I always thought in the 90s, if you can’t even win your own league you’ve got no right to call to be ‘promoted’ to a better one.