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Did Celtic Send Out Season Ticket Renewals Knowing The Howe Deal Was Dead?

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James is done for the night, but having just seen one of his tweets I’ve been inspired to pop on and ask the question that he seems to be posing in it; did Celtic send its season ticket renewals out knowing the Howe deal was on the brink of collapse, and hoping that it could sell as many as possible before the story was allowed to seep into the media on a Friday night?

One of the recurring themes in James’ blogs is politics, and as he’s fond of reminding us the weekend is the traditional “good time to bury bad news.”

It also matches the closing of the stock exchange; it’s surely not a coincidence that Celtic released their statement on this after 5 o’clock, when the final bell has rung and everything’s on hold until Monday.

Already we’ve seen a drip-drip-drip of rumours and names, but none of them is going to appease those who were wavering on their tickets or anyone who’s decided to wait.

Indeed, one of the names – Ange Postecoglou – is such a low-rate choice that it will be a nearly impossible sell for the supporters if he turns out to be the guy we’ve wasted three months for.

The club’s desperate attempts to spin this are just embarrassing.

Their statement is pathetically weak and desperate.

James was on the Endless Celts podcast at the start of the month and pointed out that leaving this to chance was flirting with disaster; you just don’t do that if you’re in charge of a multi-million-pound organisation carrying the hopes of tens of thousands of people.

The best thing you can say about it is that it’s suicidally risky … they can express their “frustration” all they want; they already have many thousands of people’s money in the bank.

And that’s why I’m writing this, and that’s what my question is tonight; when did we know that Howe wasn’t going to be the guy?

Are we expected to believe that this is something that only became clear this afternoon?

Because that doesn’t wash, not at all.

Everyone I spoke to on the night the season tickets went up for sale smelled something fishy in the timing.

Now, a lot of us assumed – James certainly did – that the club had jumped earlier than they’d have liked. He speculated that it might be because The Trust had put out the information that their share proposal had been rejected the night before.

I didn’t believe that would have moved them.

I read every word that came out of Celtic Park and in the blogs about the season ticket offer, and it didn’t seem right to me that they would have gone before they had a manager when they were actually telling us that an appointment was only days away.

Why not wait the extra days and maximise your sales?

The only reason that made any sense to me – and others – was that the Howe deal was either in trouble or already dead.

Worse still, you’ve got to wonder who the Plan B is and whether the club is still hoping to sell season tickets before that name is announced.

I’ll go further than some of the other guys on the site would go; if you’ve bought a season ticket already you’ve been made to look like a mug, but you will look like an MIT graduate next to anyone who pays for one now, before the announcement on who the manager is, because only a complete fool would continue to believe a word that comes out of Celtic Park.

The Rumour Guy is a Celtic fan and blogger from Glasgow and is not renewing his season ticket.

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