GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - FEBRUARY 05: Brendan Rodgers, Manager of Celtic, looks on prior to during the William Hill Premiership match between Celtic FC and Dundee FC at Celtic Park on February 05, 2025 in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)
“Man, we just couldn’t stop laughing.” – Stephen King, Hearts In Atlantis.
That quote opens one of the segments of one of my favourite books, Stephen King’s Hearts in Atlantis. They made a terrible, terrible movie out of that book—because they didn’t really understand the book itself. Mostly because it’s one of his least-read works. It is King’s book about Vietnam, and the Vietnam generation, and how those people grew up leaving their past lives behind as quickly as they could.
It’s actually a book of multiple stories that all intersect. That line is spoken in the second of those stories, the titular one, Hearts in Atlantis. It’s also the epigraph for that particular part of the book.
The story Hearts in Atlantis is one of the finest things that Stephen King has ever written. It’s about a young college student who goes to university with big hopes and dreams, and over the course of his time there falls in love with a rebel, moves from being a card-carrying Republican to being an anti-war Democrat and, over one terrible semester, comes very close to dropping out altogether.
Because in his first year, in the shadow of the war—when college dropouts were being sent to the front lines every other day—he almost blows his entire degree and his whole university life by getting sucked into a revolving tournament of the card game Hearts.
I felt a real kinship with Pete Riley when I was reading the book, because at every stage that he sits there in the common room playing cards, he feels that the hole is getting a little deeper and his chances of getting out of it a little slimmer. And he knows full well that he might be throwing away his future—and even his life.
It’s about wasted time. It’s about wasting opportunity. It’s about those moments when you can feel the sand trickling through your fingers but don’t know how to stop it. Or rather, you do know, but you don’t take the action that would get you there.
What finally saves Pete Riley’s life is watching an accident. It’s watching one of his classmates get himself into trouble on his crutches, trying to traverse an icy path on a horrible day when the rain and the snow have turned everything to slush and mush.
And for a brief few moments, he and his card buddies are convulsed with laughter, watching this guy flat on his back, in serious discomfort. It’s that moment that makes Riley realise that they’ve all gone a little crazy.
“Man, we just couldn’t stop laughing,” is what slaps him out of it.
And I can imagine the assembled PFA delegates sitting with their drinks last night, laughing just like that, as John McGlynn went up to collect his Manager of the Year award.
But these people aren’t going to snap out of their peculiar madness.
I have no hope for that at all. And whilst I like McGlynn and think he’s perfectly entitled to a moment of recognition, they didn’t honour McGlynn because they believed in him last night. McGlynn was nothing but their convenient prop to deny the trophy to Rodgers. And having done so, I hope they enjoyed themselves mightily.
I hope they had a good laugh. I hope they laughed until their throats were sore, until they pissed their pants. I hope they feel pretty good about it today. Oh hungover, yeah—but oh so merry and jolly.
Because their conduct is embarrassing. Their conduct brings disrepute and shame upon the game here.
They gave it to McGlynn last season too.
But Rodgers may not have argued with that, because he lost a League Cup, and he took his time to get the team playing football. But Rodgers is on the brink of making it five trophies out of six. Normally, you’d think that a manager who did that would get recognition from somewhere. Rodgers, in fact, may equal his own record as the only manager ever to win a treble in Scottish football and not be named Manager of the Year.
It’ll be quite the thing for him to do that twice. He should probably get his own specific honour for that—his own little special bauble to hang on the Christmas tree. Because that has to be a unique achievement.
How you can twice sweep the board and not get the award for either of them? It’s pathetic. It’s parochial. It’s small-minded. It’s jealousy, to be perfectly blunt.
Especially as Rodgers is the kind of guy who will do anything for anybody and has looked out for a lot of people in Scottish football even when he didn’t have to.
Spoken up for them even when he wasn’t required to.
Defended this game and its reputation even though he wasn’t expected to.
But there are people in this game who would rather give that award to just about anyone else they think they can get away with, than give it to him.
It’s all a bunch of bullshit to pretend that this is an award given on merit, that it’s not political, that there’s not a bunch of people playing favourites.
It’s just ridiculous. It’s an embarrassment to the game that a manager of the calibre of Rodgers can come here, do everything that’s expected of him, and still not get the reward. And yeah, there are people who will say, “Yeah, but he only did what was expected of him.”
So now, suddenly, excellence isn’t something that we should recognise?
What a cheap, nasty little environment this is. What a petty place. And it’s all the more ridiculous for this snub having been predictable. I was joking about it all week long, wondering how they were going to justify giving it to David Grey. In the end, they didn’t bother. They just gave it to John McGlynn instead.
And man, they just couldn’t stop laughing.
Funny, funny joke. But they don’t get it. They don’t get that it makes the game itself look like a joke. They don’t get that their little bit of small-mindedness, their pettiness, the sense of grievance some of them have—because Rodgers is successful, because Celtic is successful—makes the whole game here look like shit.
Because anyone looking at it knows exactly what that decision was based on.
Brendan Rodgers goes to Hampden at the end of this month having never lost a game there. He’s lost one match in cup competition in five and a half years in Scottish football.
Five and a half years.
I knew he wouldn’t get it last season, although he deserved it.
But I didn’t think that a man on the brink of a treble could possibly not get it. Then I remembered that they did it to him once before. And that’s when I stopped thinking he was a lock. That’s when I knew they’d find a way not to do it.
It’s not for nothing that I call this madness. It is a form of lunacy. These people are fiddling whilst Rome burns. It’s as simple as that.
Football in this country is in a desperate state—from the club game to the national side, from the absence of any reserve league to the failure of every major club to bring through a steady stream of players who graduate to their first team squads. The whole game here is in crisis.
And these people are sitting there, laughing their arses off.
Decline is always evident in the small things.
In the chickenshit—which, as I’ve written before, is actually a term that came out of the military. Paul Fussell, in his book Wartime, described one of its characteristics as “a constant ‘paying off of old scores.’”
And doubtless that’s at the heart of Rodgers being snubbed for a second time whilst on the brink of a domestic clean sweep. Celtic managers aren’t allowed to do that.
They’re not allowed to get too far ahead of themselves. They’re not allowed to be successful in this way. And certainly not this manager.
So they gave it to McGlynn.
Congratulations, I guess.
The mobile phones must have been red hot with the back-and-forth on that one, just to make sure they didn’t split the vote between him and Grey.
Don’t tell me that wasn’t worked out. Don’t tell me there weren’t people putting that campaign together. There had to have been.
Because in any normal world, Rodgers cleans up this year. But here, the lunatics are in charge of the asylum, and last night, they had their little joke.
And man, I bet they just couldn’t stop laughing.
The year they gave it to Gerard when it should obviously have gone to Callum Davidson for winning both cups tells you all you need to know about the voting process!
Having watched Greg Taylor for 80 minutes yesterday while Schlupp was on the bench, and Scales failing for the entire game with Rocki nowhere to be seen, I don’t believe Brendan deserved anything.
We have just one, predictable way of playing, and teams have cottoned on. Maeda was in Japan all week and just training the day before the game, he looked burnt out. The Rangers midfield bossed our 3, and Jamesie was constantly ran past by a 38 year old Balogun with a face mask.
The amount of players we’ve bought (BR been here 2 years, how many of his players were on the pitch) with Schlupp and Engel both his players yet neither played the full match.
His rich contract is accolade enough, flat team, lack of plan B and boring at times to watch football.
You failed to mention losing 7-0 on Europe and the fact we can’t defend crosses or balls into the box.
That’s some good points you’ve made there Dave,as for the manager ,I can’t for the life of me think what’s going on between him and nawrocki,who any time he has had game time looks a capable defender , certainly better than scales and trusty so why does Rodgers not play him,is it a personality clash? even so as a professional manager Rodgers should play his best options which clearly he doesn’t at times, also would Idah have started if Jota was fit?and obviously maeda had too much on his plate this week, flying back and forward to Japan he should have been rested,but I still think it stinks that Rodgers didn’t get the award.blame the silent compliant spineless Celtic board for that.
Schlupp is no upgrade on Gregg Taylor, probably around the same level, Nawrocki is no upgrade on Scales again around the same level. That’s just my opinion. Anyone blaming Scales for the Rangers goal yesterday in my opinion is being harsh, we might not like to admit it, but it was a brilliant goal on the break by the Ibrox mob and Celtic as a team were caught completely flatfooted
I agree we need a plan B or even C, when teams play the high press against us, and our defending of set plays wasn’t good yesterday. If Jota and Kuhn had been available I don’t think Maeda would have played, add to that, Yang was just coming back from injury.
I think you’re obviously not a fan of BR, You mention the 7-1 defeat in Europe without mentioning draws against Atalanta and Bayern away, plus being unbeaten in the 1st phase Champions League 4 home games, which is a big improvement on recent Euro campaigns.
Scottish Football has just made a fool of itself, and belittled its top tier competitions with this snub to Rodgers and Celtic.
Scottish football is a laughing stock in oz. Says it all really. I can go watch far better games weekly with far better entertainment and football than the dross served up in the home of the beautiful game.
Crisis? What crisis as long as a taig is still kept at the back of the bus there is none.
In short, the game is fucked, in short the game is up and for all our so called power at board and political level for all our trebles and trophies we are still taigs at the back of that bus.
Until the roots are exposed, uplifted , removed and the placed limed in it will remain so.
You have to ask after watching that tifo , that display, the raining down of vapes and a bottle or 3 onto vinisallos workplace why does anyone fucking bother! . I ask you would put up with lighters, vapes and bottles being lamped at you in the workplace? Ffs! .
But we do , celtic do the board do , we taigs do because just like brendan found out we really do sit at the back of that bus .
Its time we said enough.
Frankly I don’t care who wins this award which is down to other people’s opinions.
What I and Brendan will care about is winning awards on the pitch.
In a way this is a compliment to Celtic as we are expected to win all the trophies.
I’m slightly surprised that Barry Ferguson didn’t get it.
Real Madrid and the Fakeover Consortium sent a delegation to the PFA Awards last night to start a bidding war for McGlynn to ensure they have a top manager to replace their outgoing ones. Ancelotti and Barry ab gutted. Scotland just cannot hold on to our top flight guys like John who bring our game to elite levels.
There was never any doubt BR would be “ snubbed” as if BR would give a flying you know about what that bunch think. How many times have we seen Brendan’s pressers concentrate on the total lack of respect for Celtic and their many achievements. They will never get it in Scotland.
I’ve advocated many times that Celtic should adopt an isolationist policy. Don’t let press or any media anywhere near us, no access to Parkhead or any of our staff. All things Celtic should be on the website or Celtic TV etc and we should heed the words of Leonidas Give them nothing but take from them everything. Without Celtic Scotland would be a total football wilderness and an irrelevance
Thankfully like the Ibrox lot do every year, Celtic we’re not in attendance at that charade
That’s why people turn a blind eye to the bigotry and hatred in football and in society in this country.It keeps plenty of people in a job.Pundits, columnists, tv, radio, etc, etc,etc.
I read somewhere Doncaster is on £450,000 a year.Unbelievable.
That’s why they keep talking about the O** F***.
Never bite the hand that feed you.
Even if it was conducted in an impartial and totally professional manner, ah dont necessarily think BR should have been givin it for the treble. There’s other factors that would have tae be taken intae consideration first. Thats just my opinion.Tho that award finally lost any credibility at all, after gerrard got it before Callum Davidson. In fact, if ferguson had won the Scottish cup they’d probably have given it tae him. Nothin would surprise me.
As long as Celtic keeps winning everything every season that will do for me and knowing it rattles Banana republic Scotland will give my heart a warm glow. I see nothing has been said about objects thrown at Sinisalo a bottle of buckfast was thrown at him. that lot are a disgrace but nothing will be done about it. Come on Celtic win the treble and stick it right up The SFA and all the Celtic haters.
It’s somewhat nonsensical that these awards are made before the season is ended. I could make a case for and against Rodgers winning as we’ve made progress and played some excellent football this year, yet we have also dropped our standards at times.
Not sure McGlynn is deserving for the second year running – if Aberdeen win the SC, a better case could be made for Thelin for the run at the start of the season and for managing to turnaround what looked like a sinking ship after losing to us in the LC semifinal.
I don’t think Rodgers will give two monkeys either way for this bauble.
It’s not anyone but Rodgers, it’s anyone but Celtic…. and it always has been.
Could this not be though, just a bigoted gesture to welcome the “Wee Rangers” into the SPL.
Personally I couldn’t give a Continental Fuck about these ‘awards’
Brendan has won The League Cup…
Brendan has won The Premier League…
He is a CHAMPION…
That’s all that fuckin counts !!!