Celtic’s board can help progress this club or they can burn it all down.

As this transfer window ticks down, without any real sign of intent or ambition from this club, we edge closer to a major confrontation between the fans and the board, one that could define Celtic’s future in the most negative way imaginable.

Boycotts now feel increasingly likely, including, quite possibly, a season-ticket boycott. If this board chooses to entrench, there is no telling where this crisis will end, or how badly it will scar the club.

From the very start of the campaign, I have said the fans will win.

By that, I mean we will outlast this board of directors.

This board will go, either of its own volition or because supporters force it out. I have never doubted that outcome. There is no route to a final victory for them. There is no scenario in which they simply carry on as normal indefinitely.

Their range of options has narrowed to the point of self-destruction. I genuinely cannot see a single upside for them. If they try to brass-neck this out, they will not stabilise the situation. They cannot. All they will do is dig a deeper and more damaging hole.

The return of Martin O’Neill paused the crisis, but only temporarily. It staved off the immediate threat of a boycott, but the way this transfer window has unfolded ensures the issue will resurface soon enough.

Fan frustration now sits at boiling point. The board appears to be making things up as it goes along.

No strategy exists. No long-term plan reveals itself. They stagger from one crisis to the next, surviving day to day. If this were a manager, we would already describe him as a dead man walking. Game to game. Living in the danger zone.

That is exactly where this board now sits.

From the outset, people told me they would simply dig in their heels.

Every regime tries that. History tells us how it ends. It never ends with the regime outlasting its critics and living happily ever after. It ends with collapse. And when collapse comes after prolonged arrogance, it comes hard. It scorches the earth.

A soft landing still exists. One where people leave with dignity, credited for finally doing the right thing. But when those in power choose to burn things down instead, they guarantee the opposite. This board may yet choose that path.

But to what end? It does not bring success. It does not bring victory. They never stood a chance of that. Torching everything only fuels resentment and intensifies anger. It sharpens supporter focus on their removal.

At a certain point, those who begin this journey no longer need to justify it. Neutral fans stop sitting on the fence.

If supporters come to see the board as actively running the club into the ground, they will act accordingly. If the board responds to that by alienating even more supporters, how does that possibly end well?

Those in power always believe they can crush dissent.

Our board has already tried. It banned fan media. It banned the Green Brigade. Talk has circulated about targeting The Bhoys next. But you cannot ban everyone. Every piece of the Celtic Park experience you strip away exposes you further.

Every act of punishment multiplies anger an narrows your escape route.

Do not forget: these are not distant billionaires hiding in gated communities on the other side of the world. Desmond may be, but his foot soldiers live here.

They walk among Celtic supporters every day. If fans see them as responsible custodians, they have nothing to worry about. If fans see them as men deliberately and cynically running the club into ruin to protect their own power, consequences will follow.

That may not be fair. It may not be pleasant. I am not justifying it. But it is reality.

Supporters will not accept the gutting of this squad as a necessity.

They will see it as a choice, because it is a choice.

Alternatives exist. Fans have asked only that these people recognise their limitations and help transition the club from where it is to where it needs to be. That means resignation. Help the club move forward in your final days in office.

Do that, and you leave with respect and goodwill. Refuse, and tear up the floorboards while the house burns, and you leave with anger ringing in your ears. In a year or two, if this club is on its knees, not even your strongest defenders will stand beside you.

If this board continues as it is, Celtic will suffer repeated disasters.

Two things have saved us so far. Exceptional managers in the dugout, and weak domestic opposition. If that opposition improves while we combine incoherent recruitment with poor managerial appointments, supporter backlash will reach levels unseen even in the 1990s.

This club does not survive on sugar-daddy money. It does not rely on massive TV deals. Celtic functions because supporters fund it. Season tickets. Merchandise. Loyalty.

If fans conclude the club will stagnate for as long as these people remain in charge, and that the only way to remove them is to cut off cash, then that is exactly what will happen. Every cut, every ban, every act of downsizing will confirm that these are selfish people with no right to sit in those chairs.

At that point, the board can behave like every hostile regime before it. Impose harsher measures. Assert its authority. Pretend it is untouchable. But history shows what follows. Hostility grows. Anger deepens. And eventually, that anger sweeps those regimes away.

The moment supporters recognised their own agency, this outcome became inevitable.

From the moment fans organised and demanded change, these people were done, and only the method remained unsure. Only two paths existed, and both lead to the same destination. The difference lies in how they go.

Leave voluntarily, while damage remains containable, and they can still claim they put Celtic first. Delay, break things beyond repair, and they leave to jeers, remembered forever as men who chose themselves over the club.

If they believe the fans are bluffing, they should remember this: the fans are not the ones making the decisions that reduce everything to ash.

They cannot escape their fate. They can only delay it, and in doing so inflict enormous damage on Celtic.

That damage will not be forgotten. It will not be forgiven.

Everything changed last summer.

The moment this board deprived the manager of resources, whatever the motive, it deprived the club of what it needed. At that point, their right to call themselves stewards ended. Whether intentional or not, that decision made them the enemy within.

Nothing they do can undo it. Nothing can restore the moral authority they forfeited. Once you cross that line, you do not get a job for life. You do not get to call yourself a worthy custodian. Their future was written in that moment.

The only decision left is how they choose to go, and they will.