Callum Is Right To Swat Away Ibrox’s CEO. Celtic Isn’t Focussed On Their Daft Posturing.

Callum McGregor did us all proud again yesterday when the hacks tried to get him to say either something nice or something nasty about the latest public strutting from someone at Ibrox, this time James Bisgrove, their new CEO.

Bisgrove is up to his neck in many of the court cases which have rocked their club, the latest of which I wrote about yesterday. But he’s getting good press right now because he claims to have a “plan” for making their club “the dominant force.”

What’s his idea of dominance anyway? I’ll tell you what mine is; 17 trophies from a possible 21 in the last seven years and we’re on course for it. So unless he plans to win the Euro Millions and give their club every single penny of it his plan had better be rock solid, because as I pointed out earlier in the week we are sufficiently strong that if we want to push the boat out we can render anything they do utterly redundant, and Ange is planning to just that.

All the egotistical strutting over there becomes tiresome after it. It’s amusing up to a point but when it gets into high-gear like this – and it only took one win – it becomes boring and irritating to listen to. The thing is, we’ve got a whole summer of this to come … but in the meantime, we’ve got games to play and Callum McGregor is focussed on those.

Celtic will not let up on our planning. We won’t be distracted by whatever the Hell they do, sure and certain in the knowledge that if we get our own business right there’s really nothing they can do. They aren’t the threat they think they are.

The threat, as it’s ever been, is that our own club’s leaders become arrogant, lazy and complacent again … and whilst Ange is in the manager’s office and running the whole show that’s not going to happen. Callum knows this, of course, and said so.

“To be honest, I don’t think we look at any outside noise at all,” McGregor said, absolutely nailing this issue in a simple sentence. “I’m pretty sure if you asked the manager at any point in the season, is he looking to strengthen the club, or if you asked the players, are they looking to strengthen their own game and collectively together, then the answer to that is absolutely always.

“I don’t think in sport you can ever stand still … So as long as we’ve got a mind-set within the club that we continue to push forward, then that’s what’s more important for us as players and staff, that the club has got a vision moving forward … as long as we keep doing that and focus on ourselves, I’ve got no doubt that we’ll continue to get better as well.”

And right there he’s saying it, right there he’s pointing out what this site and others in Celtic cyberspace have been since the weekend; we have the fundamentals right here, we have the right attitude, approach and ideas. We are focussed on our own improvement, for its own sake, and are not particularly interested in what’s happening over there.

We, the fan media, has to be. Because what they do over there affects us, and the environment in which our club operates is often hostile and dominated by a media which is more interested in promoting their cause than ours .. .that is the reality.

But I’ve always been glad that inside the club the focus is ever on those things Callum talks about; improvement, progressing ourselves, getting to a point where our natural progression is what leaves them behind. Our natural progression.

We are closer to that than we’ve been at any point since they crawled up out of Rangers’ grave. Had we won ten in a row it might have happened already; we’d have been level with the Lie in terms of titles and we’ve already be ahead on trophies won.

But those things are well within reach and as I said earlier in the week, when they are no longer able to boast about being “the world’s most successful club” we’ll own them. We’ll have crushed the last straw they clutch to and rendered the Lie irrelevant. Because that’s all the Lie is about; it’s about propping up that nonsensical claim.

We won’t get there by having our manager and players focussing our thoughts on them. We’ll get there by ignoring their bluster and bullshit. It is great to hear our captain reiterating that intent.