When he departs this club, and he should be looking to do it as soon as possible, Peter Lawwell’s waning powers will never be better expressed than in two major transfers of genuine quality players out of Celtic Park and the poor fees we’ve had for them.
In the past 18 months we have sold two players – Juranovic and Giakoumakis – needlessly, and for ludicrously low sums of money.
I could not believe either of those deals went through for the paltry figures which were being talked about. Liel Abada’s fee is a bit better, but I still don’t understand why we’d accept it right now.
Listen, Abada was finished at Celtic and I stopped caring weeks ago whether we ever saw him in the club’s colours again. If he goes to the States, he will have demonstrated clearly that he was effectively on strike at Parkhead, that he had downed tools.
There’s no trauma here, just another player who has spat the dummy and gone in the huff and no sob story that subsequently emerges from this will be in the least bit convincing.
As I’ve said previously, if he’s not “mentally fit” to play for Celtic he’s not mentally fit to play, period. If he’s genuinely pained by the plight of his countrymen (the ones doing the killing right now, need I say again) that doesn’t end the minute he walks out of Parkhead for the last time.
If he goes and pulls on another team’s jersey right away, then what we’re being told is very obviously untrue and any sympathy people at Celtic should have for him evaporates.
I couldn’t care less what he does with the rest of his career, such as it is.
He should have left this club much the richer for his being here and he should have gone to play in a top league. Instead, he’s off to that holiday destination competition in the MLS and if he returns to Europe at all it will certainly not be at anything like the level he had set his heart on.
His agents, who have raised merry hell behind the scenes here, have cost themselves and the player.
It’s a colossal waste, and instead of fronting up to the people who have, by their insistence, wrought terrible damage on this guy’s career in the name of “saving him” from the evil clutches of Celtic, they’ve done his prospects lasting harm.
Well, so be it. In the end, there are no winners except right wing drum banging nutters who he was a fool for ever having trusted and listened to.
No, my concern is with Celtic and the way we’ve handled this. The geniuses in our boardroom have obviously let themselves be absolutely outthought and outfought here on this and we’ve basically allowed a solid gold-plated asset to depart for a nominal fee, and that speaks to a streak of yellow running through our club right now.
£8 million plus does not seem like such a derisory sum, but we held the cards here and we’ve played them lamentably. We’ve got him on a long-term deal and this could have waited until the summer, and a chance to offer him to the clubs south of the border. Why this deal has to be done now, just because the MLS has a window open, I do not know.
It reeks, to be honest, just as selling Giakoumakis and Juranovic for nominal fees last January reeked. To those who claim, erroneously, and when they are seeking to make excuses, that you don’t get good deals in January, I suggest they explain how two clubs were able to take top players from our squad in that month for such low sums of money.
We’re leaving millions of pounds on the table here, and for what?
For the sake of a few months, it seems to me. Whether he’s here or gone, he’s not playing any part in the side and we know that, so it makes no sense to do this now when we can wait until the summer and see what proper interest we can generate then. The money’s not going to help us in the here and now, and his wages aren’t going to equal what we’re potentially losing out on.
He and his agents are forcing our hand, that’s what it looks like, and I can only conclude that it’s because their national team doesn’t want to play him whilst he’s at Celtic and they have play-off games and possibly the Euros to come, but that’s their problem and his, and we shouldn’t be letting that dictate what we do here.
The only questions we need to ask ourselves are these; has Abada copped flak from the stands? And have we done everything we can to make him feel welcome at the club?
The answer to the first is no, not really, and the second is yes of course, and so we’ve fulfilled our moral obligations, we’ve done all that we can do and if that’s still not enough hard lines to him and his agents because he signed a long-term contract and that means we hold the cards.
We’re entitled to hold onto him until the moment is right for us to sell.
It doesn’t look, to me, like people at our club have the stomach to protect our own interests here as vigorously as they might. This could have gotten ugly; so what?
It’s ugly already and it’s not us who have made it that way.
Celtic has done nothing wrong here, on the contrary. So why are we rolling over?
Does our CEO not have the stomach for this stuff? It appears not. This raises more questions about how he was ever hired in the first place.
He allowed this summer to descend into farce.
A good CEO should have seen where the manager and the scouting department had started to deviate from each other and he should have stepped in and got that sorted.
I can’t expect any person to be everywhere and on top of every issue but this guy has definitely let too many things go off the rails on his watch. Look at the incidents yesterday; anyone waiting for a statement from the club is in for a long wait, I suspect, but somebody has to put their signature to something like that, and who’s going to do it?
That should be the job of the CEO. But he’s invisible and annonymous. That’s not necessarily a negative in every respect – I actually like the low-key approach better than Lawwell’s rampant egotism – but there is a time for being in the background and a time for making yourself visible and leading from the front. If he doesn’t want to do that he’s in the wrong job.
He is not effective in his role, and so if we’re being honest it seems to me that he’s another one whose position needs to be looked at in the summer, and looked at hard.
Totally agree with that summation, if he’s not up to the job then he must be replaced.
Of course ah know till no publish this, but FFS, did you see what Hamas did in Israel, how they tortured and mutilated women’s whilst they were raping and eventually killing them, how they set babies on fire, mutilating their corpses – this all came from Hamas livestreaming it btw, so kinda difficult ti refute.
So unless yir utterly drowning in yir idealogical leftism, can yi no see how abada might struggle running out onto the pitch and see massive messages of support for the animals who did this in his homeland.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/28/world/middleeast/oct-7-attacks-hamas-israel-sexual-violence.html
So, and who’d ah thought and ever say this but the only time in the last 10+ years am no being critical oh Pedro the Hun – no, this one’s all on us in the terraces, that have chased away a £20 asset for ½ price
Absolutely not the point.
My friend, what you see on TV and online and what happens in real life in this day and age are two completely different things.
What you are referring to in your link was staged. I have Palestinian friends who swear this type of thing never happened (the baby burning and mutilation). These people are everyday human beings like you and I and would NEVER let the sort of things you highlight happen in the everyday. They are in fact distressed that the wider world would even suggest the everyday citizens would even let this happen.
We are living in a Walt Disney world of made up media hysteria where virtually everything you see is filmed on blue or green screen, in this day and age where we have to be at our sharpest for every minute of every day to discern the truth from every lie.
We, the fans have had nothing to do with “chasing” a player away. If you are familiar with how the Israeli network works then the only conclusion to this matter is that the officials in Israel have told Abada and his representatives that he will NEVER play for his country again while still playing for the hoops, a club and a people who still held their hands out in friendship for Abada and always will. And I’d even say that if you were to sit down personally with the young lad he would probably tell you personally he’s very happy with the club and the fans.
God bless you my friend. Wishing you all the best.
What about the everyday human beings like you and I Israelis who went to a music festival, having a nice time with their friends and family, untill they were assasinated by racists ? I take it they don’t matter because they are not Palestinians.
Sooo…how do yi know that you know the real version oh events…….
Maybe yir mates are either bullshitting you, or just ill informed…..
Also, when yi say about living in Walt Disney world, yi know he was a massive anti-Semite – the truth hiding in plain sight….
I agree with you mate. We’ve chased away a good player in Abada. I know I wouldn’t want to play for the Huns with a feckin Union Jack being waved in my face every week.
Totally agree sold of some of our best player’s on the cheap, Abada should been sold when we could get the optimum money for him not to suit him and his agent.Had a bit of sympathy at the start but feel we have been used by them and he was just useing this not in right frame of mind nonsense as an
excuse not to play.There seems to be plenty of support for Palestine in USA so we will see what happens with him over there.
I really couldn’t care less what Celtic get for players. We got £25M for Jota and look how much good that’s done us.
Excellent point roonsa.
Your well named the joker,personally I would suggest the arsehole is more appropriate,whether you like it or not the main man endorses Lawwell who isn’t a fat ponce,he gets paid for doing the job and obviously many of us aren’t pleased with the results of his endeavours,why are you advocating boycotts,maybe getting the supporters who are investors and maybe the Celtic trust to demand a meeting with the board to let them realise the strong feelings that the supporters feel and take it from there,I would never support a boycott as we saw the results during the covid season without the fans.hail hail
I’d say it’s a good price for Abada. Celtic fans made their bed with Palestine whilst having two Israelis in their team, what else is to be expected from two groups of people who’d throw a party if the other was wiped off the face of earth?
It’s a victory for us humanists, belive me he could not continue playing for a humanist club. His country and he knows it are comiting genocide. On this reason I could not give a fuck about how much we got for him, I would be quite happy with £1 seriously.
He just needs to go – He is weak and kinda the runt of the (playing staff) litter at Parkhead…
And when ya close The Paradise Door Liel – how about talking Lord Lucan-Nicholson with you and Daddy Lawwell as well for good measure !
Nothing changes at Celtic Park, we have continously let players go for sale, sale,sale prices and its players thats went on again to get sold for record prices. This team is falling apart in front of our very eyes. Its unbelievable that this present board are watching this happen with absolutely no action. Take note Celtic supporter’s, your being made a complete are of by this lot. I’m getting ready to turn my back because this is too painful to watch.
U know what what a load of nonsense. 8 million plus add ons cheerio bro. Forget Palestine flags whatever he worked his ticket but if it affected him that bad so be it. Deal with the real issues ie board transfer policies manager Brenda’s Rodgers will be aclaimed the best man manager but as a team manager bye bro unfortunately it will cost us millions