Today, John Kennedy spoke to the media as a much-reduced Celtic side returned to pre-season training. We’ve lost Idah, Bernardo, Hart, Haksabanovic and Oh has one foot out the door. There is no question that this is a weaker squad. The window has been opened for three weeks. Not one signing has been added to the mix.
Kennedy has told us that the club hopes to have some business done in “the next couple of weeks.” In a little over a fortnight time, we’re flying out to the States. The manager is entitled to have some new players in the door before that flight takes off, because this will be where he experiments with his system and finds the best way to fit them in.
I get tired of hearing how difficult this stuff is. It’s difficult if you’re haggling over small change, it’s difficult if the motivation to spend money is not really there, it is difficult if the manager is being second-guessed by people who aren’t qualified to do so. It will be interesting to hear what Rodgers himself finally says when he’s sitting in front of the media.
Kennedy offered nothing.
The club knows how important it is to bring in a keeper? Yeah? Really? I thought they knew how important it was to sign a left-back before the January window closed. I thought they understood the importance of signings that prepared us for the European campaign last summer … and they didn’t.
I’m not interested in people at Celtic paying lip-service. Fans want to see action. They want to see concrete signs of progress, not listen to the assistant manager talk in vague terms about how he’s sure things are happening behind the scenes.
That’s not going to cut it, that’s not going to cut it at all, and that message should be loud and clear.
Amongst the teams we’ll face in pre-season is Manchester City.
That’s a chance for people to test themselves against one of the biggest sides in Europe; right now, we’d be going into that game with a skeleton crew including a reserve goalkeeper. And sure, there is time to get some good players in and some big deals over the line … but too often this club does this.
Too often this club drags its feet. In every window in living memory we’ve left some of the most important business to the very last day, and that is how deals end up slipping through our fingers.
Why is it that every Celtic manager in recent years has taken issue with the speed at which things get done at this club?
Even Ange expressed his anger and frustration that things weren’t happening quickly enough in his first campaign; as per usual, two of the biggest signings – Carter Vickers and Giakoumakis – came in during the last hours of business.
I bet if Rodgers had sat in front of the hacks today he’d have expressed his frustration at how long this stuff takes.
On some of the deals he wants done we really at the mercy of events elsewhere; the Idah thing is not in our hands, and we are playing wait-and-see on that one, but on other issues we should be doing more and working a lot faster.
Enough of the “spinning plates” already Celtic. Close some deals.
Because talk is cheap and as long as certain people are still in the building, there are credibility issues which make this harder than it has to be.
Spot on as always.
Sadly Share Price will take Priority as well as Corporate Bonuses
Liewell,liewell,liewell get this money grabbin Tory bastard OUT ,as long as this rat is at Celtic nothing will ever change.as for idah imo it’s time to move on let’s look at getting miofski in and fur fcuk sake stop wasting time on new signings.
i smell lawwell……or is this delaying tactic just a mindset at this stage ?..as you say james, why, oh why is it always the same with us..unless, the players we are interested in, are involved for their countries..the euro’s and copa america ? we can only hope…
Public enemy NO.1, lawwell, he sanctioned the previous signings, let him move them on , no complaints it’s his doing, if he thinks these players have to leave before new signings come in that the manager wants that’s his problem, sign the players Brendan Rodgers wants now you miserable bastard, that’s what happens when you think you know better than the man who saved your arse last season , stick to the shadows, you’ve taken enough money out of our club , let someone who knows what their doing get on with the job he’s paid to do.
Kennedy offered nothing because he knows nothing. Even if he did know something Lawwell would be working him from the back.
Lawwell clearly still pulls all the levers at the club, we’re going nowhere until he’s removed. The support needs to get their heads around that.
The choice is simple, take it on the chin as per, or get the protests going. There are no excuses, the club has never been wealthier, but the insistence is that the club is run like a corner shop for the benefit of a few decrepit tory bastards.
Season ticket money’s banked. Let’s see what happens here.
Just remember that Kennedy is another of Lawwell’s stooges. Why he is still at the club is beyond me. He has done nothing to deserve his place and I hate all the quotes about how managers rate him highly. I most certainly don’t.
@GR. Agree 100%.
Can you clarify on that? He’s a coach at a successful football club and works, mostly, behind the scenes at Celtic Park. So what is it he does that annoys so many people?
He represents continuity at the club. I think that’s a good thing. I understand the set piece thing that people bang on about a lot. And, whilst I would be mortified if he became another stopgap solution if Brendan were to leave, I am not sure why people consider themselves well placed to judge him so harshly.
So if we sell Matt O’Riely for 25m, intake of season ticket money 30m, Champions League of 40m and with cash in the bank we are looking at nearly £150m in the bank.
Why are they not spending ???
All this money belongs to the shareholders, this could be payday ?
Am I the only one that has fears of a cash grab or sale of the club. ??
The money does not belong to the shareholders. It belongs to the company. The money they take out the company will be well documented as Celtic is a plc.
When Fergus McCann floated Celtic as a plc, he gave the fans every opportunity to acquire a piece the club offering interest free loans. The man who was booed on flag day in 1998 did this for the fans.
When he sold his shares in 1999, small shareholders (primarily supporters) owned 63% of the club. That figure is now about 27%. That reduction will be down to, no doubt, a corporate strategy employed by Dermot Desmond who owned 19% but had a controlling interest as the major shareholder with lots of connections.
But the point is, Celtic fans had the opportunity to prevent Desmond becoming the overlord that he now regarded as. He did the groundwork to put the fans in this situation. There’s not really much we can do about it now except choose whether or not o keep pumping money into the club.
Fergus got booed essentially because he wouldn’t pay the extra 500k to buy kinkladze the season before. A signing that likely would’ve got us in to the champions league. This was on top of rumours of not paying players unless they actually played in a game, with burns putting players on late on so they could get their money. And ball boys being sent back out to get balls that had went in to the crowd. Fergus wasn’t above criticism. But Fergus was the very man that saved our club and set the blueprint for where we are now, and made himself a few quid in to the bargain. I love the wee man for what he done but I was one of the fans that booed him, and later applauded him. I’m also one of they shareholders that helped build the stadium, and don’t get any dividends, and got it diluted with the next issue.
But hail hail all the same
It sure has that old familiar “Pedro the Hun* stench ti it, doesn’t it…
It actually wouldn’t surprise me if even with tens of millions in the bank and more tens of millions to come, that this board is waiting to see how much they get for O’Riley before they spend any money! Anything less than a net spend of £20m in this window is a money grab as far as I’m concerned! I feel another anti-board sing song could be ringing out as the SPL flag is unfurled!
@ dixie d. Yeh, and if this board stick tae their usual pattern this time they should be hounded out. And btw if they dae, ah can see BR walkin again and who could blame him ?!
Sevco get their signings in no problem. But Sevco also pay handsome salaries to shite players that will come play for them.
I think our main issue, and I’m not really defending the board here, is that without paying over the odds, we’re after players that other decent clubs, in arguably better leagues, also want to sign. And as soon as that happens, players can sit back and wait for the best deal.
Look at the transfer market just now. What signings have Arsenal, Chelsea, Man City or Man Utd made. None. If you want quality players, chances are there are other clubs in better leagues after them. It’s better to patient and get the quality we need than just signing project players like last year. The season is still a month away. Judge then not in June!
Sevco are winning trebles and more in The Transfer Window Title Race as they do year in year out….
Lawwell and Lord-Lucan Nicholson have been so so very lucky to have had Ange and Brendan to bail them out especially Brendan in The Sonny Lawwell financial tragedy –
But their luck won’t last forever as both Ange and Brendan have already shown them !