Here’s The Thing About The Celtic Fan Media Doomsayers: We Want To Be Wrong.

There’s one thing about this job that has always annoyed me: those times when, in a moment of high positive emotion at Celtic, I get an email or a message suggesting that I must be feeling pretty miserable.

Now, don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t happen often.

But on those occasions when the club does something absolutely perfectly—whether that’s winning an unexpected game, clinching the title against the odds, or exceeding expectations in some way—I’ll get the occasional email from someone with a mocking tone.

Just the other day, I got a message from someone saying, “What will you do if we sign 3-4 good players? You’re going to look like a bit of an idiot.”

That made me laugh.

The inference is that because we’re doing well, I must be miserable.

And let me repeat; this doesn’t come from people across the city. It comes from fans of our own club, from people in our own house. I find that extraordinary and rather strange. When it happens, I think to myself, “Oh, in a moment of triumph, someone out there is thinking about me or their fellow supporters and pondering our imagined misery instead of celebrating,” which is what I’m usually doing.

I think that says a lot about those people, and none of it is good.

As we head into the last few weeks of this transfer window, there’s a sense from some that if things turn out better than many of us anticipate, part of their satisfaction will be how stupid some of us look for having dared to be critical, for having dared to suggest that we ought to be doing things better, for daring to suggest that maybe, just maybe, this isn’t the way a club our size should do its business.

What those people don’t understand is that we want this window to be a success. If it is, we’re not going to sit around moaning and groaning, feeling sorry for ourselves because everything we’ve been saying for the past 50 days has been wrong. We want to be wrong. We want to be made to look flat-footed and foolish. If it turns out that way, believe me, the happiness others feel will not come close to how happy we will be.

As Richard Nixon said, “It is only when you have been in the deepest valley that you can appreciate how magnificent it is to be on top of the highest mountain.” That’s where many of us find ourselves right now—in a valley.

We want what’s best for Celtic. We’re unhappy, upset, angry, and frustrated because the club is falling down on the job. But if this window turns out better than it currently looks, if we do business better than we currently are, if we come out with a stronger squad than we currently have, the joy others feel at saying “we told you so” will be nothing compared to how elated we will be to see the club be what it can be and what we’ve been saying it can be.

When that day comes, and I hope it does, I’m not going to waste any time sitting around wondering how I’m going to face the masses. I’ll be out celebrating the strength of the team, the position of the club, and the destruction we’re going to wreak on the team across the city.

If people think I’m going to look and feel stupid if we bring in four or five good players, they completely misunderstand what I and other bloggers do every single minute of every single day. This is a love story. If our version is a little harder than the rest, if our outlook seems more pessimistic, think of us as practitioners of tough love.

Sometimes, you’ve got to give a kick in the pants to the things you love. Sometimes, you’ve got to poke it with a stick. And mark my words, it will only be good emotions we’ll be feeling if, and when, the big signings start to come in.

The really crazy thing is, it doesn’t matter which side of the debate you’re on. Every single one of us wants the best for this football club.

The only difference is, the guys on my side badly want to be wrong. If we are wrong, we’ll celebrate that fact. What I want to know is this: if we turn out to be right, will those on the other side even acknowledge it?