There are some strange stories in the papers this morning. Boy oh boy. Jack Hendry is thanking Clement as the man who brought him to Belgian football and the media is loving that. I don’t know why there are loving it.
Because first, he wasn’t signed by Clement. Nobody was signed by Clement. That’s not how it worked for him in Belgium or even in France.
But really, is having signed Jack Hendry for a lot of money really something anyone should be boasting about? Jack Hendry is a very limited, very basic, footballer.
He’s done well as part of Steve Clarke’s Scotland system, but I wouldn’t have any of those centre backs at Celtic Park. Porteous is one of them. That should be all anyone needs to know.
One of the things that Hendry’s success in that league strongly suggests is that the Belgian league isn’t exactly amongst the strongest on the continent.
Their national team had an exalted status some years ago, but almost every top player in that team was playing outside of Belgium. And I’m not suggesting we’re something special compared to them; Christ, I think we’d all have loved a De Bruyne emerging out of Scotland. We’re miles off the pace.
But already we’re getting some interesting insights into Clement that perhaps the media does not intend.
We’re learning things, but not the things the press thinks that we are. In spite of that, it’s clear that when it comes to his signing policies that we’re not going to learn that much whatever the press wants us to believe, because he had no transfer input.
Is he going to Ibrox with a say on signing players? Do they know what his judgement is like? How can they if he’s never done it before?
If he looks at that Ibrox team right now, why in God’s name would he had any faith in theirs? Every question about this guy leads to another question, and the main one is “what in God’s name is he doing at Ibrox?”
All the questions will be answered, of course, when the window opens but until then the media’s efforts to boost this guy’s credibility by talking about signings should be ignored. He has a managerial record to scrutinise but nothing whatsoever to look at it in terms of the players he has brought to his clubs.
And Jack Hendry? Dear God, that is desperate stuff.
the fanboys of the press here are now on the lets bring home him who is on loan to hearts [boy wonder] and the my god his da was some player hagi , who knows maybe if they could get a girdle to fit big d.j. maybe big fatty could do a job for them .
Wonder what Clement thought after taking his first training session?
With his experience, he must have a ‘gut feeling’ about the quality of
the squad and the personalities…or lack thereof?
And today he might be banging loudly on the Blue Room door,
demanding that a Sporting Director is appointed ASAP?
Delivering just the LC could be an achievement with that squad,
[with ref / VAR assistance included, of course].
And the pattern repeats itself: feel good pish for the gullibles, who will lap it up until inevitably it crashes and burns, Clement gets pilloried in the press and gets hounded out of the country. Deja vu ad infinitum.
I actually feel sorry for the guy.
Tomorrows Daily Record exclusive by Andy Newport
‘ Read how Phillipe Clement inspired Kevin De Bruyne to reach his way to the top ‘
Think ur being a bit harsh on big Hendry he’s not looked out of place in the Scotland games
He may or may not be the man they’re dribblin about at mo, time will tell but as sure as nite follows day the press will be drooling over him, we’re talking bout the same eejit that done the same way pedro, and every other crusty that’s got out the clown car,,they’ll prob get a new manager bounce to start, but the sublime blooters up the park will be back
Totally agree with your straight the point assessment of Jack Hendry. He seems to be at the centre of most errors in that defence as he was in ours with as you say limited ability and poor positional sense. That must have been a freak season he had in a weak Belgium league to have acquired so many admirers over there and now it seems across the city. Nothing I’ve seen of him in a Scotland jersey impresses.
As for Clement, again you’re bang on. Every hun I hear seems to want to big him up, just like Beale, GVB, etc, etc, etc. Listening to them say again and again year after year that the new manager is the right man for the job, needing time only to turn things around as they have repeatedly said, managerial appointment after managerial appointment. Sounds like they’re stuck in a ‘Groundhog Day’ ‘Krueger’ time warp. They love to apportion blame, forgetting of course that it’s themselves, the cobshite fans, that don’t have the patience to give their manager time before they turn on him forcing their spineless board/s to wilt under their pressure.
They want their club, the new low budget club, to be run like Celtic and have Celtic’s successes now, hiring the likes of Park to identify immediate impact talent for the first team that they can’t afford and with money that they don’t have. They want to be like us and put in place unaffordable project players that they won’t wait on to develop.
They want their board to be financially prudent too, to put in place and undertake all the tasks they require to become like us but to spend all the money it takes and more to stop us overtaking the combined total of the old club and the current club.
It’s that very support that highlights the delusion and false reality that they live in. It’s not something they do and it’s great to see them not understand it. They never walk the talk.
Their failure to see that it’s them, the so called fans, and their sense of entitlement and superiority that is their major weakness. Everyone else is to blame. It costs money and lots of it to sack short term managers and staff on long term contracts. Replacing managers and coaching staff and taking everybody to court eats up what they don’t already have.
Once again they’re saying the new manager may have to get rid of the failing players they pumped with adulation on their arrival and rebuild on the rebuild. They point to his league successes abroad and say that if he can’t turn this swine of players around then they will have to wait on the transfer windows for Clement to bring his own players in. As you said something he has never done at any club and waiting is something that they just won’t do in spite of the words and lies they tell themselves.
You could feel sorry those managers that actually believe in what they’re told, not Beale of course, and of the terrific support and backing that they’ll receive from the fans in those soon to be empty stands. But why. They make a small fortune from hun failures, their own short terms stays and the hun misfortune of birth. History is the best predictor of the future, they should read the script or maybe in fact they have, realising there’s lot of money to be made out of them in a short term.
It’s a ‘Thin Blue Line’ you’d think was of Eltonesque proportion and one that could only be invented in the mind of such a comedy genius. This though is a true story, it’s real and repeated Baldrick like cunning plans are simply marvellous to watch.
Truth with them has always been far from reality since their conception in 2012 and it seems that there’s already ‘One Foot In The Grave’. Who says there no fun in watching repeats eh? HH