Celtic have the third highest average attendance in the UK for this season, behind only Manchester United and Arsenal.
This stat proves conclusively that things at our club have not looked this positive in years. It’s the Brendan Rodgers effect, and it should give our directors, and our fans, food for thought as we head into the AGM on Wednesday.
Everything at Celtic is positive at the moment, except the issue I raised here late last week, on Resolution 12 and the fans campaign to have it brought full circle. The club needs to act on that, and the shareholders need to make sure that they do. (You can read the article below.) Aside from that, I can’t remember when we were last in this good shape.
Financially, this is going to be the bumper year to end them all. Projections vary, but we will certainly top the £70 million mark and could even post close to £100 million if you believe some of the more optimistic predictions. We’ll land squarely around the £80 million in my view, which puts us on a par with some of the lower EPL teams, who minus their television money would be far, far behind us in terms of our size and our stature.
The term “big fish in a small pond” has never seemed more apt.
The feel-good factor at Celtic right now will be mightily enhanced if the club goes into this transfer window and strengthens the crucial area of the team which needs it most; the defensive midfield berth. A lot of focus has been put on signing a creative, attacking midfielder. I disagree that this is a priority; we have at least three of them already and Armstrong and Rogic are coming onto a great game and Ryan Christie will get – and deserves – his chance.
We don’t need another player in that area, but if Brendan decides to purchase one anyway I’ll trust him absolutely, but I’ll wonder who’s leaving.
There is money for the Rodgers project. The question will arise as to whether it’s worth spending it in January or in the summer; for me that’s an easy one. There might be players who aren’t available until the season ends, but nothing could be better than bringing in who we can quickly, to let them get to know their team-mates and bed in for the next campaign.
And yes, I just made a case for spending less in the summer.
If we show the right signs of life now we won’t need to spend a fortune then.
But it has to be done. Brendan has plans and those plans have to be supported by the people who are running our club. Too often at times we’ve failed to build on strong foundations, and I am not advocating that we construct our policy on a dependence on Champions League football; only the most foolish clubs do that.
Yet the rewards of getting there are obvious.
The Champions Route gives us a good chance to make it to those groups for the next few years; what happens after that will depend on UEFA reforms, but I am optimistic about those because the European governing body has stated, over and over again, that it has no interest in locking clubs out.
That bounty could be there for us year on year. We can vastly improve our chances of getting to it if we give Brendan the tools to do the job.
Keep the feel-good factor going, Celtic.
In seven weeks’ time, when that window opens, Brendan needs to be backed to the hilt.
To read the Resolution 12 article please click here.