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The Champions League Is All About The Financial, But Not The Fair Play.

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Tuesday’s defeat at the hands of Euro-elite side Paris St. Germain probably came as no surprise to the majority of Hoops fans.

Or football fans Europe-wide who now know that the Financial Fair Play rule is nothing more than Butterfly Stitches hiding a gaping wound. It’s not been enforced and unless UEFA acts most will remain convinced that it never will be whilst the cash flies in from the competition.

With a front-line of Neymar, Cavani and Mbappe it was always going to be an uphill task and they will strike fear into most teams.

By giving Neymar £200m as a World Cup Ambassador to buy out his own contract, PSG have danced around the rules and how they got around getting Kyrian Mbappe on loan is bewildering. They seem to be masters at finding the loophole and exploiting it.

Financially, Celtic are miles ahead in Scotland and it’s pretty ridiculous to say otherwise but the future of European football looks like it will be an elite of around 20 clubs mostly coming from five countries; France, Germany, Italy, England and Spain within the next 5-10 years and that’s wrong. Our position in Scotland is due to good house-keeping and financial management. Unlike others, we didn’t go to rack and ruin chasing the impossible dream.

To say we have supremacy is not elitism; prior to Celtic winning the Treble a plethora of other sides have won the Scottish and League Cups. But the league was monopolised by two sides for so long that with one of them gone no-one can see an end to it.

But it’s like that in many other countries.

They have their own problems to deal with as the elite clubs get stronger.

All this will leave Scotland as an even bigger backwater with less money coming in. Any aspirations of moving to England to progress or become part of football’s elite is pie in the sky and gut-churning to be frank. I’d prefer we improved on the European platform than become part of this well-heeled, corrupt club ran by Oligarchs and cash-rich oil barons.

Lessons like Tuesday will, sadly, become commonplace in football’s New World Order; look at Man City’s demolition of Feyenoord, a club who Celtic faced in the 1970 European Cup Final. Both of our clubs have fantastic history and tradition whereas PSG and Man City are simply beneficiaries of what could be described as a lottery win.

A shell-shocked Qarabag will be licking their wounds after a doing from Chelsea whose success is down to a huge cash reserves injection by Abramovich.

It’s common knowledge that UEFA want the Champions League to become a competition for those who have and not for the “have-nots”. These sorts of games will be seen in Nyon, and elsewhere, as proof positive that UEFA have a case.

Celtic will make around £30m from this campaign but in fairness that is pocket change to most of the elite sides, although it does certainly send the annual turnover up. But the imbalance is growing at a rapid rate.

Should we be content with being a Pot 3 or 4 Club?

In reality, we are not going to win the competition but aspirations of qualification from the Group should be real but that is slowly ebbing away. I don’t want to enter the Champions League in the forlorn knowledge that our ceiling is the Group Stages.

As much as we as fans embrace and love the competition and the history it’s given us, and the romance, we know in our heart of hearts that the relationship is dead and our childhood sweetheart has outgrown us. It grinds me to say it, believe me.

Do we as fans really think that UEFA gives two hoots as to whether we won in ’67? They don’t. There might be a minor co-efficient bump from next season but the competition itself is going to be ring-fenced with us looking on in awe.

Do you really think Heineken, Gazprom et al think Celtic, Ajax and Anderlecht among others are big players? Within UEFA’s boundaries there are fifty-five European leagues, thirty-eight of which have no participants in the Champions League. Yes, Celtic are at the top table, dining, but it’s the crumbs in reality and it’s like someone going to the Ivory and ordering a glass of tap water. Our pockets aren’t deep enough to tuck into the fayre.

As utterly distasteful as it may seem to fans of the clubs outside of the big spenders UEFA don’t appear to care about fans or the development of the game on the larger scale.

Is it getting to a stage that we are content with turning up, although we’re getting thrashed by the top two seeds, getting 30m for the coffers and hopefully dropping into the Europa League as gate crashers so we can continue the European “party” after Christmas?

This isn’t getting better and I’m full of dread at the visit of Bayern Munich and the trips to both Germany and France.

It may seem on the face of it I’m bemoaning the result from Tuesday but I don’t see how we prevent this getting worse in coming years as finances rocket elsewhere.

What enjoyment, as fans, can we take from this whilst alarmingly paying top dollar? It’s akin to paying £20 to Sky to watch Mayweather school McGregor. We all knew it was coming but hoped that McGregor might do the unthinkable. He put up some sort of show early on but was left staggering around like a drunk at the end.

It’s extremely difficult to see how this is resolved.

An Atlantic League type cup? Does that not belittle “big” teams?

I’m scratching around for an answer but one thing I do know is this; unless the FFP rules are enforced properly then the game really is up.

Gavin McCann is a Celtic season ticket holder, sick and tired of watching teams cheat by spending what they can’t afford.

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