GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - FEBRUARY 22: Former Celtic Non-Executive Director Willie Haughey during a William Hill Premiership match between Celtic and Hibernian at Celtic Park, on February 22, 2026, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Rob Casey/SNS Group via Getty Images)
Over the past few months, Celtic fans have heard a lot about disruption. We’ve heard about distractions and negativity. We’ve heard about division and we’ve been blamed for it. Celtic fans have heard more talk about harmony, unity and everyone pulling in the same direction than at any point in the past two decades.
While the club talks about unity, it has banned fan media and kept the loudest and most passionate supporter organisation out of the ground. And that is before we even get to the continuing smears about threats and intimidation.
That was the stick. Now comes the carrot.
Now someone offers a voice. Someone promises community. There is somebody talking about ownership, or at least a few shares each.
Willie Haughey has ridden to the rescue, just months after telling Celtic fans to lay off Dermott Desmond.
He promises up to £10 million in shares will be given to season ticket holders. He will pay for those shares himself.
All you have to do is send him your email address and season ticket details.
On the surface, it offers supporters a place at the table. It tells us that season ticket holders form the heartbeat of Celtic and that, through this new Alliance, they can become part of the club’s future.
On the surface, it sounds attractive. It sounds inclusive and empowering.
But before anyone gets carried away, some very basic questions need answers. There is more grey area here than a Glasgow weather forecast. More grey area than in a referee’s decision at Ibrox. So let’s be at least a little careful.
First, what exactly are these shares?
Are they ordinary voting shares, or symbolic holdings that look nice on a certificate but carry no real influence? If they carry voting rights, the second question follows immediately.
How much power does £10 million actually buy?
At current valuations, that buys somewhere around six or seven percent of the club at best. That gives a voice, certainly. But it does not deliver control. It does not change the balance of power. It does not force decisions and it does not win shareholder votes.
Then comes the most obvious question of all.
Who is selling £10 million worth of shares?
Shares do not appear out of thin air.
Buyers must either purchase them slowly on the open market, which takes time and pushes the price up, or a major shareholder must agree to sell a large block. If that happens, supporters deserve to know who and why.
Until someone answers those questions, this proposal does not offer power.
It offers the promise of power.
Let’s not confuse one with the other. Celtic supporters have heard promises before, and experience tells us not to place too much trust in them.
Until more details emerge, we cannot know whether this scheme has the club’s approval or aims to challenge the current structure. That distinction will decide whether this succeeds or fails.
This Alliance targets season ticket holders specifically. Not all supporters, not the global fanbase or the millions who follow Celtic from afar. Not even the disaffected supporters who have stepped back in recent months. Just the 54,000 who contribute financially.
What do you bet this ties directly to renewals for next season?
That creates a very clear message. If you want a voice, you need to stay financially committed.
What about the tens of thousands it excludes? Whether intentional or not, this approach changes the nature of what is being proposed. This is not supporter democracy. It is representation weighted by spending.
That raises a bigger question.
If this Alliance becomes the recognised “fan voice”, who does it actually represent?
The entire support, or the most financially committed segment? What happens to the non season ticket holders in The Collective? Hell, if this becomes the “fan voice” that matters, then The Collective becomes unnecessary, doesn’t it?
How convenient that would be to some people.
And while you consider that, consider this. Who controls that voice? Who holds the proxies?
They will decide how those shares are voted, and on what issues.
Because the real power in any shareholder structure does not come from how many people own shares.
It comes from whoever controls the block vote.
That person, or those people, can use your vote however they choose.
I sat on the Glasgow Young Labour executive when an NUS Scotland President named Jim Murphy stood up at conference and reversed the organisation’s position on tuition fees. He held enough proxies to make it stick.
So this is not an academic question. Someone will decide how those shares are used. Someone will speak at the AGM on the Alliance’s behalf.
Right now, no one has explained how that will work. That matters, because the language around this proposal does a lot of heavy lifting. Harmony. Unity. Singing from the same hymn sheet.
Supporters have heard those same themes for months, during a period when people labelled dissent as distraction and disruption. That is exactly why we owe it to fellow fans to examine this carefully.
Here is what I see, and I do not claim to speak for anyone else. This proposal offers a vague and unspecified form of participation, but only within the existing structure. The organisers hope to gather enough supporters to approach the current leadership and say “these fans deserve to be heard.”
I am not sure those behind this proposal genuinely understand the scale of supporter frustration with that leadership.
That is a conversation for another day.
Put simply, this looks like the stick followed by the carrot.
That does not mean the intentions behind it are bad. Stability matters. Unity matters.
Celtic is stronger when the support pulls together.
All of that is true.
But unity built on clarity and trust looks very different from unity built on promises that still lack definition. Trust will return only when those who exhausted it no longer sit on the board. No amount of messaging will change that.
If supporters are asked to buy a voice, they deserve to know exactly how loud that voice will be. If they are asked to invest in the future of the club, they deserve to know what influence that investment delivers and what that future actually looks like.
That is where the biggest grey area lies.
If this really aims to give fans power, then the structure should be transparent before the sales pitch begins. In football, as in any business, the difference between ownership and influence is enormous.
The real question for Celtic supporters is not whether the offer sounds attractive. The question is whether the power being promised is real, and whether it challenges the current leadership or simply helps sustain it.
Because the unspoken reality of the carrot and stick is this. Even when you receive the carrot, it remains tied to the stick. It hangs just out of reach, encouraging you to keep moving in the desired direction.
Supporters have seen enough of that.
What they need now is clarity, transparency and real influence.
Not another promise.
James, this new set-up you have going on with the blog isn’t working very well. There are adverts overlapping some of the articles’ text. Making it impossible to read.
Calm your jets James. It was an article in the DR. Probs a load of nonsense
.
Possibly a more advanced step than throwing tennis balls.
I smell s**t
Exactly.
When I saw it I wondered the same. What shares? Whose?
Season ticket renewal is fast approaching,so how do we make sure the fans buy them.
Let’s give them worthless shares and make them feel important.
Aye right.
It’s a con job from the griffters stealing a wage on the board.
On acsom I seen a clip of him on Go Radio and I immediately wondered about his reference to tennis balls killing the atmosphere, basically taking the boards side before he proceeded.
Free shares for your email and a say in the club? Great ! Though when something looks too good to be true it usually is. As you point out JF, is this a board tactic to marginalise the Celtic Fans Collective and remove all it’s power and influence?
If so then it is nothing new as rulers have used this tactic with massive success for centuries against burgeoning new movements by creating their own which is more palatable to the ruling class and effectively keeps them in power.Social democrat parties were subverted to marginalise the huge pull of socialism throughout Europe in the early 20th century, where once they were a light of socialism their smaller right wing faktion was backed until it would take over and they became capitalist, there by keeping the ruling class in power.
A certain country did this with great success by using billionaires to support left wing movements then using them to attack nominally left wing countries it wants control of.
Anyone who says lay off DD after his behaviour this year then purports to be on the fans side warrants great scrutiny as this could be the Trojan horse that brings down Troy.
Ps. I know the Trojan horse is a mythical legend and not fact.
It does have the whiff of proxy vote about it. It offsets smailes attempt and at 10million its cheap. Id wager its bankrolled by desmond as well
This is divide and conquer.
This is ensuring ST will be renewed
This is to be laughed out of the room
Couldn’t agree more. I said similar on Joe’s blog last night.
Willie Haughie is an out and out Celtic stalwart and what he is proposing should not be scoffed at. His intentions are honourable, for would never do the club or the fans any harm and I am sure he is quite genuine with his proposed alliance offer. Willie cares about Celtic and is trying his best to improve a fragmented relationship between the club’s hierarchy and the rank and file supporters. I support him wholeheartedly, for nothing else seems to be improving the present situation. I wish him all the best in his aims and admire his intervention for the good of the whole club.
Fair point — his idea is worth a dabble.
Couple of pointers in his business dealings suggest he is / was in the market to run the club.
DD must be looking for top dollar and playing hardball at the moment to get the deal over the line. The whole “I bought it for the weans” vibe is just so much hot air for a guy with his heart in Barbados. Plus Jr’s recent gum bumping suggests that it is family first for him and independent thought is still on his to do list.
Might be one reason why we are in such a state — pay up or the football team gets it in a Blazing Saddles sort of way.
The Fridge Magnet would make a difference so hopefully this is the first good idea ,of many.
Totally agree Johnny. I know Willie personally and can confirm he is a Celtic diehard. Absolutely loves the club and the fans. He’s a working class bhoy from Toryglen who’s done well for himself and has never forgotten his roots. I’m definitely interested in what he’s suggesting. HH
As a self-identifying cynic who could find something suspicious in a saints sock drawer, I may be very wrong with this but the two words that are coming to mind with this are ‘Dave’ and ‘King’…….. I’m always wary of false prophets and messiahs who hitherto hid in plain sight.
There are certainly details to be filled out with what is being proposed, but I wouldn’t question Willie Haughey’s intentions or love of Celtic. He played a key role in saving the club in the 1990’s.
Getting more shares into the hands of ordinary Celtic fans is key to securing a role in the future direction of the club and maintaining its true identity. And we have to start somewhere. Distributing shares to 54,000 season ticket holders is one way of ensuring the shares are held widely by Celtic fans. I get not all fans have season tickets, but probably the most effective way for WH to validate bona fides. And maybe a route towards a true members (fan) club like they have in Spain.
If we want existing major shareholders to exit the club then we as fans need to be thinking of buying those shares otherwise we’ll risk being run by some faceless offshore LLC.
It seems an obvious pro-board, more precisely pro-DD, gimmick thrown out into the ether via the Daily Ranger in order to neutralise the threat that exists to this board’s job security at Celtic plc and that is that fans, either of their own volition or through a concerted campaign by the Collective that the majority of fans rally behind, decide not to renew their season tickets.
Haughey may well be a Tim but what does that count for when he’s a multi-millionaire and a Lord first and foremost? That guy who told the working class Celtic supporters showing dissent against the entire board from the stands of Celtic Park to lay off his pal and even more filthy rich businessman, Dermott Desmond. The legality of what His Lordship proposed as somebody with no official role at Celtic plc or FC is dubious too and could cause problems we need like a hole in the head especially if the financial regulators investigate the authenticity of DD’s officially stated place of permanent residence which he lists as being in Gibraltar. I’m sure taxes have nothing to do with that but Rangers (d. 2012) were sure their EBT scam would fly under the radar of HMRC for over a decade too. The rich look out for each other but you’ll be hard pushed to find one of the greedy bastards who isn’t listed as a philanthropist in their protected Wiki pages.
Why did Haughey not say publicly to the Celtic board “get the 200+ fans you stole season tickets from despite your own assertion there was no evidence of wrongdoing by any of them, back into their seats or I’ll fund their class action lawsuit for damages against you myself!”? Because his natural priority was to come to the defence of a billionaire and to take a swipe at the little guys with no money, no power, no say, no seat inside Celtic Park despite having paid for one each up front.
But history especially Celtic’s is testimony to the fact these little guys are far from powerless – DD & co wouldn’t be in their positions at Celtic had fans not made the old board’s monopoly control over Celtic untenable following years of growing discontent at how the club was being mismanaged off-the-park before that board made way for one that at least had a vision and plan of how the Celtic of the future would operate and look like, much of which was successfully accomplished. This board can’t tell us how the Celtic of next season will operate, who’s going to manage the team (still MON imo), what the goal is going to be – stay in the top six or be champions by the end.
They will be able to say the club will still be a cash cow for them if they’re able to hold onto their jobs and a crap shoot for fans who can have their season tickets stolen back off them and no reason need be given, and share prices and dividends will continue to rise regardless. But only if fans buy those season tickets in the first place. I will never be back at Celtic Park while this board has directors who remain. There’s nothing they could negotiate with me except the terms of their departure at the end of this season.
Wood vs Tress
Baby vs bathwater.
Sorry — wrong on quite a few fronts.
Interesting proposal — the trick would be for the Fan Collective to push it hard.
Therefore if there is to be any fan guidance to the voting intentions of this share grouping then the good guys are in pole position to shape the response.
Plus the Fridge Magnet gets himself back in the game regarding influence on the workings of the club. Plus he knows what growth is — the acceptable face of capitalism in the face of the arbitrage shenanigans / local small town favours / opportunistic punts of the Irish raj.
Money where his mouth is — plus it might start a spring clean of the share register to activate lost and dormant shareholdings from the 1990’s.
Getting involved is where we need to be — turning your nose up at the efforts of others will get us nowhere.
If I’m wrong explain how giving away ONE free Celtic plc share (current price £195) with every £800 season ticket bought is going to empower anyone who is unhappy with the state of affairs in the boardroom. That’s assuming he’s offering the LSE OTC shares and not the ones that would currently stand at just £1.95each although it doesn’t matter, it’s a grain of sand compared to the sandy beach of shares held by Dermot Desmond. Director Thomas Allison and Desmond combined hold over half of the total shares held in total.
But before trying to explain how 50,000 shares held by 50,000 fans holds any sway over any of the top shareholders at Celtic or gets you a seat at the table with DD who holds at least 32,772,073 shares himself, not counting his shell companies’ stakes, how do you get past the fact that legally this would be such a serious departure from the financial regulations that govern the stock market where shares are bought and sold – not given away inside a free Kinder egg with your season ticket which has nothing to do with the stock market, by a man who has nothing to do with Celtic plc – that we’d be kicked out of FIFA/UEFA governed football faster than Sevco FC and never allowed back under any guise? Add to that the prison time those involved could potentially face, and frankly for what they’ve done to Celtic FC no sentence could be harsh enough, and it becomes even more obvious how unreal and insincere this die-hard Celtic man – who is a knight of King Charlie’s realm and a life peer in London’s House of Lords so not what I’d consider a die-hard Tim, although I’ll not argue against him having Celtic as his favourite team in Scotland – and this offer comes across as genuine as Wilson’s overtures about meaningful communication with fans and negotiations with fan groups. Again, these dinosaurs who’ve sat on the board decades longer than they should have in many cases, only have one thing they need bring to that negotiating table and that’s the keys to Celtic Park in their pockets in exchange for their safe passage out the door and their bus fare home. Otherwise I’ll not be back and I don’t think the fans need any official announcement from the Collective that buying a season ticket for next season is a vote for more of the same that we had to endure this season from the same shysters except probably worse. In fact Celtic’s revenue is forecast to fall next season and the following one after that which is a sign of how this board intends to proceed if they’re given that long.
Where you are wrong is in your understanding of WH’s mechanism of what he is proposing. He has said he will buy up to £10m worth of shares (at today’s share price of £1.95 this equates to a touch over 5% of total ordinary voting shares in issue) and then gift these to individual season ticket holders. Nothing that he is saying is in breach of Stock Exchange or Company Act rules and regulations. I get that 5% doesn’t buy control but as fans if want to have more control over the club then we need to start somewhere. Personally I think that the Collective should engage constructively with WH to see how we can make his plan or a variation of it work. WH has huge credibility within the business community and having him onside can only be a positive. As stated before I do not doubt his good intentions.
If it’s in The Daily Scummy Record as some of the guys are alluding to then its liable to be pathological lies with them !
It all looks a bit underhand, but there has been no mention of a season ticket boycott by the collective. The boycott for the Dundee game only got 40% of the fans backing it, and its doubtful they will get near that level for a season ticket renewal boycott….with the threat of losing your ST completely.
A sit down between the Collective and Haughey where pertinent questions can be asked would be an easy way to see if this is a positive move or not
Look into what happened at Queens Park and Willie Haughey