From their vantage point in the main stand yesterday, the Celtic board must have been delighted to see fans back in the ground and booing Leigh Griffiths.
It’s the final “proof” that they’ve gotten off scott-free.
Whatever the player has done, he isn’t the cause of the major problems which still afflict this team, they are.
Yet he got the boos, and they escaped the flak.
But they should have watched that game yesterday with deep embarrassment.
That’s the state we’re in right now on their watch.
Things will probably improve as Ange slots pieces of the jigsaw into place, but with supporters now back in grounds and likely to stay there, yesterday’s booing of one particular footballer will be nothing compared to the fury unleashed on them if we suffer an embarrassment on that scale in a competitive match.
Yesterday the lack of planning and the poverty of certain parts of the playing squad were exposed in their full gory detail.
A board of directors long since bereft of ideas or ambition, these people really have no right to sit at the helm of an institution such as this and pretend that they belong there.
Last season exposed them for what they are; old fat white men without a strategic thought in their heads.
The farcical events of that campaign will haunt them forever.
But Hell mend them if this one starts to disintegrate.
They dodged most of the flak last season because of the lack of supporters, but if they had any sense yesterday they’d have looked at the treatment Griffiths got and seen a glimpse of their own futures … minus the section which decided to vocally give the player support.
They will be lucky to get a slow handclap.
When Ange Postecoglou was appointed, I wouldn’t be surprised if some of them thought he might act as a lightning conductor.
If so, then that turned out to be a whopper of a misjudgement.
Fans have gotten behind the big guy because of his straight talking, his passion for the game and his clear-headed understanding of who we are and what we’re about.
That understanding isn’t shared by a single one of the people on our board.
Not one of them “gets” the support the way Ange does, and if this team isn’t built to his specifications then the blame isn’t going to fall on him, it’s going to fall on them.
Dominic McKay too has a big week ahead of him.
Right now we’re barrelling towards the next signing deadline with no chance whatsoever of having a right back ready to register.
When you think of what PSV Eindhoven might do us to right now … and this, of course, supposes that we’re even going to get by the Danes in midweek with that back line.
If these people had any concept of Celtic as a big club they’d have been mortified yesterday.
A West Ham team without key players and three weeks behind us in their preparations almost casually swatted aside this team. From a club which only a handful of years ago had an elite level manager and was qualifying for the Champions League Groups to this.
On their watch. And I see no sign that they’re even bothered about it.
Those at the top of our club still refuse to rise to this moment.
Yesterday was a warning shot.
Yesterday it was Griffiths catching the flak, but their own is not averted, only postponed.