The incident has overshadowed what went before and is occupying everyone’s thoughts tonight. Rightly so. It’s a disappointing way to drop points but the award was not us being massively cheated.
Our manager says Gary Hooper tried to get out the way. I disagree. Tv pictures clearly show him make a movement towards the Udinese player and make no attempt to get out the way. It was a tired forwards challenge and one if up the other end would have had the neighbours wondering what I was screaming for and who I was murdering.
So forgive me for not wallowing in self pity and at this moment I’m glowing at what was really a humdinger of a game. These 6 o’clock kick off’s are the future if that is the fare they serve up.
Both teams were brave and adventurous. A draw was a fair and overall pleasing result with us getting more positive than negatives. Plus we even scored a penalty. It’s all ready on E-Bay as a collectors item.
Bag the goals and watch the penalties before they disappear.
On watching it again there’s no contact by feet, Gary’s put his arms up to show no contact on his part, but he was typically naive of a Celt in Europe.Just the movement toward his path gave the guy all the excuse he needed to go to ground.
If only we were as cunning in Europe. We may get somewhere.
I felt it was soft but rather naive of hooper, he moved towards the player and made it an easy prospect for player to throw himself to the floor. Did feel we may have deserved a second penalty shortly after the first one. Felt bang bang was a poor mans samaras however, woeful with the ball in any sort of space, contrast bang bangs cross with sammys cutback to ki, I hope both come good however. Think Lennon got it wrong as if ever there was a team to pair stokes and hoops against this was it. They weren’t a good team and we should have done more with the ball as we had it for most of the game.
Interesting. I thought Ban Bang showed something. If we can find and polish that something we could have a player. Samaras is a lost cause, it’s going to end in a messy divorce.
Stokes has been poor recently, I understand the dropping but don’t make sense of it.
I have never written on any of these blogs before, being happy to spectate from the sidelines, but after witnessing the display tonight of Georgious Samaras I feel compelled to put in my tuppence worth.
Every time I have seen him leave the field over the last year I constantly say “Surely to God that is the last time I will see him in the hoops!”
He is without doubt the most ineffectual player I think I have ever seen play in the forward line for Celtic. Sure we can all conjure up other names from the past…… Tony Cascarino, Harold Bratbak, Owen Archdeacon etc but these guys scored goals or at least laid some on for team mates. The Greek tragedy does none of these things. His positional sense is appalling, vision non-existent, heading abject, shocking in the tackle and also seems to have an incredible knack of losing his footing under even the lightest breeze.
This is all before I even begin to talk about his passing or indeed his finishing!
Instead of playing a pass twenty yards to a man Samaras would rather run sixteen yards dragging two defenders to his team mate and then playing a four yard pass with two players in the guys face.
This is of course if he has not fallen over in the process. His decision making beggars belief: playing passes when he should hold the ball up, finding dead ends and loosing the ball when a pass would free up any number of players not to mention his ability to allow an easy out for the opposition defence by giving away needless free kicks.
His scoring record speaks for itself, well whispers really, it is absolutely appalling for a so called forward. Granted he has not started all of the games or indeed had a lot of time in the games he has come on but he generally manages to miss at least one good opportunity. His finishing is dire.
I personally do not understand how many times you need to see the same show before you know what happens at the end. He once had a good game playing on his own up front and he seems to be played in the vain hope that he will do it again.
This brings me on to our manager Neil Lennon. To me this is his biggest challenge as our manager, on the footballing side anyway. How he man manages this situation could make or brake his tenure as our manager. It must be demoralising for other players sitting on the bench being over looked for a player who quite simply is not up to it. This will lead to disharmony in the squad and I think we can all see that the squad does not appear to be as united as it was last season. I do not believe that Samaras will be able to change his style of play, whatever it is, to prove an asset to the team. If Neil Lennon does not trust any of the guys on the bench to do a better job than Samaras then bring one of the kids from the youth set up and blood them.
great first post.
I have said that he is now a lost cause. It will be a split that will end all others.
Must be watching ban bang through rose tinted specs, he gives the ball away cheaply, plays like he’s on his own and cant pass, he’s everything people throw at Sammy but he holds himself better so doesn’t look as bad! I think he will come good with some love , but he’s not gonna command a move to the prem unless he improves drastically… but Sammy was excellent when he came on, if he was a little more match sharp then we’d have seen another goal. Shame we didn’t get the three points but least we can start to believe again… Can hear the thunder start to roll!
I don’t think we can judge Sammy rationally now with him being constantly booed.
i agree totally, stokes and hooper should have started,but once again i am on saying the same thing, one man to blame and its lenny,we were lucky to have not given away the penalty in the first half against a team who had 8 first team players rested, and once again after the game lenny shouts about refs, only covering his job folks, i said this last year and say it again, HES NOT CELTIC CLASS, rangers have been on the bones of their arse for years and won 3 in a row and sit 7 points ahead of us, honest, would any other manager still be here,,,no,,,his end of season john wayne speech,,,THIS IS NOT THE END,, ITS JUST THE BEGINNING,,spare me lenny for gods sake, i hope this is not the beginning we are seeing again, get someone else in please before its too late
Instead coming in here shouting…tell us your want for manager?
martin oneil is just doing telly,,,why not ask him, i am telling you lenny is a celtic man through and through but that doesnt make you a good manager, dont get fooled by this ,,hes an irish celtic man,
Not being fooled by his background and find it strange that you think that is the only reason we would back him. As for your MON shout have you got a 35m hidden warchest buried in the North Stand? As that is what will take to entice him back to any football club.
If that penalty Udinese got was giving to HMRC in Mordor we’d be screaming from the rooftops.
Ok, this is an oxymoron but….these type of penalties are never given in Scotland as the MIB’s interpret the rules differently from the rest of the world but THAT penalty would be given to R*ngers at Ipox against anyone.
Can agree with some of your comments,but that was NEVER a penalty I have never seen so many grown men get blown over by a puff of wind as do so many of todays footballing CHEATS !!.
I hope we never have to resort to cheating to win games !!
Oz Celt: I have always, like most Tims loved the way that we have always aspired to play the game in its true spirit.We were always well respected for playing the game in a gentlemanly fashion, tough but fair.
These days though, who does? Regardless of country everyone is at it. Does that make us good guys or just foolish? I would never condone it as an out an out tactic like the hun constantly on his airse in an around the box.BUT ! to save the day in the last few minutes, why not.
Have to admit when stokesy was cute at the bigot-dome last year , i loved it. It felt good to get the break as opposed to always being on the end of it. Food for thought.
Hail Hail
Sorry; Cheating is cheating. NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER !!!!!!!!!!!!! We win by playing football or we don’t win!.
good man, i hate cheating, porto were the worst i seen, and i said the same about our petrov who done the same, win because of football, and nothing less
WTF. Rangers had nothing to do with last night but there you all go again, pouring out the hatred whilst smearing others. But you’re not bigots.
We “aspire to play the game in its true spirit” then lap up Stokes’ dive for a penalty. No conflict there.
Chris Sutton continually fouling or being fouled in and around the box. Check the stats, he was the most fouled player in the league during his time here. He also committed more fouls than anyone else. All on the basis that it’s fifty fifty you’ll get a scoring chance from the set-piece.
Every team has its cheats, including mine. Go out now and watch schools football and you wont see any different.
Can’t agree with you LOTW in this. Have to go with Oz celt. If a man throws himself to the ground deliberately to get advantage it’s cheating.
Big football is awash with money but whilst much of the roughness has been legislated out it’s dirtier than ever in a low cowardly way.
R@ngers were only mentioned due to jimbhoy mentioning Stokesy pen last season.
We missed it and like last night when the law was followed it was a pen.
FFS get over it 🙂
It’s the European way and maybe if we had started slowing the game down when we were looking tired we would have got the 3 points. I don’t think it’s cheating, it’s street smart.
Sorry. Cheating is cheating.NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER;We win by playing football or we don’t win !.
I don’t think the Udinese player cheated.
I don’t see it’s a penalty, Hooper didn’t impede or obstruct the player,all he did was press up against the player so he was putting pressure on him. Hooper knows he can’t win the ball or stop the guy without committing a foul so he just let’s him know he’s there, just not wanting to make it easy.
We played well anyway, lots of positives, Hooper and Ki look back to form. Mulgrew helped settle the defence playing centre back. Wanyama was another reason our defence was far more comfortable then it has been for a while, looks a good player. Bangura looks like he could be good for us, skillful and worked really hard.
Bangura. Kenny Miller in dreads.
I have to respectfully disagree. It was never a penalty in my book and if that’s all it takes now then there should be a bundle every game.
Hooper does no more than turn and the first contact is from their player putting his arm on him. He made the contact and he used it as his excuse.
It was a clear dive and Hooper could do no more to illustrate that, yet the referee fell for it hook, line and sinker.
It’s a typical European penalty. We are just not used to them being given.
I don’t think I could or should ever get us to that if the typical European penalty is simply diving to win it.
Hooper’s mistake was not throwing himself to the ground when the attacker made first contact. Surely the referee would have had to have given us a free kick if he thought that was a penalty.
I saw that penalty given at Ibrox last season.
To us. On Stokes. The one Samaras missed. It’s the same thing and I’ll say the same as I did then.
OBSTRUCTION. INDIRECT free kick. Referees appear to have completely forgotten the concept in modern day football.
True. When was the last time you saw an indirect free kick in the box though?
Yep – I agree with you…at the very least I think that Hooper gave an obviously eccentric ref the opportunity to give a penalty – it was a silly challenge.
Totally agree with ‘justshatered’ on Samaras…I think that Lennon has got loads of things right in his time as manager but every time he plays Samaras I lose a bit more faith in him. It’s not like it’s even up for discussion – the guy is awful. His agent said that you should blame the defence when we concede goals but we were under more pressure once Giorgios was on the pitch because he kept giving the ball away in promising positions – there was more than one occasion when, had it been Stokes who’d come on, we would have had good chances – also Hooper seemed to drop deeper when he came on which in many ways lead to our conceding of the penalty…does anyone remember the passage where we’d been under pressure for ages – the ball broke out to Bangura in the centre circle and he did really well to off-load to Samaras on the right in loads of space? Rather than running down the line with it as anyone with a (football) brain would have done he played it straight back towards Bangura who was surrounded – needless to say it didn’t reach him and we were under pressure again…that’s text book Samaras for me, poor decision making and poor execution.
If I was Stokes I would be so annoyed – he’s never getting a chance in the big games and he has to sit and watch inept performance after inept performance by a player who is for some reason above him in the pecking order.
The worst one for me was when Hooper played the ball to him in the box then ran into space and Sammy played the ball straight back to where Hooper had come from…..
Yep – I was going to mention that one as well but thought my comment was getting a bit long!
Just think if that had been Stokes instead…his interplay with Hooper has always been excellent – why do we keep ham-stringing ourselves in the big games, it just doesn’t make sense.
On a different note, I have to say that I thought Wanyama was excellent last night – and his cover at the back made a massive difference to us defensively.
Stokes has his limitations as well.
can you tell me what lenny has got right,,rangers on the bones of their arse have won 3 in a row, sit 7 ahead, we went out of europe in the prelims, then got back in due to a technical, we need a man who can lead us and lenny isnt that man
At our best under Lennon we’ve played some great football and the players that have come in under his tenure have been in the main very good (obviously that has a lot to do with a good scouting system but he has the final say).
We were better than Rangers last season but as we all know that’s not enough – Celtic have to be miles better than them to win the league and we were not…
He is inexperienced but I have seen a fair amount of potential there – the Samaras situation is something that I just can’t get my head around though – I see no sense in it.
@lordofthewing I know Stokes isn’t perfect but he and Hooper form the best partnership for us up front and if you don’t play the best players at your disposal then you hand the initiative to your opponents.
This.
Nail on head. (but not the better than R@ngers bit)
Well said there LOTW. You couldn’t really split the teams last season and yet again it went down to the last game. The plus for me this season is that we’re 7 clear and still not playing consistently well, even although we have strengthened.
So too have Celtic but there also seems to be something missing from the team so far this season.
We haven’t got started yet. Just you wait.
SHAMarASS – there are no swear words left that are strong enough to describe this bloke. If i had to make one up it would be gettaefeckyauselesspieceashite…..
The scary thing is he is no longer doing anythng greatly wrong to annoy. He is just being himself.
Samaras looks good on the ball but he always seems to be playing in a different game from the rest of the team. Celtic seem to be more of a team for short crisp passing and movement off the ball to open up defences which makes for good viewing and good goals. Celtic generally play through the midfield as a unit.
That’s just not Samaras. He is quick when he gets space to start running but the one touch lay off and sharp turn just don’t seem to be part of his game. If ever a player was wrong for his team it’s him. I think he would prosper more at Rangers where the idea seems to be more about patient midfield and defensive passing to draw out teams with a couple of longer passes to a lone frontman who can hold the ball until three or four men arrive at pace from midfield.
Before you all go offering to sell him to us for a bottle of anything and a glazed doughnut though, his return for a striker is ridiculously bad and not Rangers standard. Just like Shite and Gravy, it could be a long 3 years for that contract to run.
The man will be a star in Serie A or any other league that Medaterrianian types dwell.
I know what we can do…November 5th we can put Sammy on a bonfire & that will be that..Then we can look around for some other poor sod to crucify..Supported Celtic for over 40yrs but the modern day fan makes me sick…
LotW, agree def Pen, said it right away. I could not believe what the ESPN team were saying. For Lenny to come out and say what he did was ridiculous. That team were there for the taking and we failed. Our cross balls all night were pathetic and Forrest, Bangura etc made Ashley Young look like Beckham crossing a ball and he’s murder.
We all know Sammy has limits, but booing him is not the answer, some Celtic fans need to have someone to blame now and again and for now its Sammy, I remember MacNamara getting it for a while . Sammy has a lot of positives in his make up, his biggest failing though is his decision making which, at times beggars belief. Some fans dont get why he was brought on, but it was simple, he can hold the ball up most of the time and also provides an outball as well as another bit of height in the box at corners etc and lets face it Udinese were in the ascendency when he came on so for me it was the right decision. He is a frustration, no doubt about that, I dont think I’ve ever seen a player who is so close to being top class but also be as close to being utter rubbish, he usually manages both in 90 minutes.
Booing him though will do no one any good, not him, not the Manager, not his team mates and not the Team.
How else do fans voice their disapproval and frustration. When the manager and coaching staff refuse to see what’s plain to everyone else and continue to fly in the face of results then, other than staying away, all you can do is vent your feelings in the most direct manner possible. Lots of people saw Samaras as a liability before his 2 goals at Ibrox. All that did was buy him some more time with the fans but that all disappeared after THE penalty miss. For his own sake, and Celtics, he should go. He is not the right man for the job but that doesn’t make him a bad person.