Chris Sutton is right. What’s happening at Celtic is “borderline criminal.”

Celtic has been so bad this season that I’ve wanted to scream at times. When I heard Chris Sutton say the words “borderline criminal” about the state our leaders have this club in, I didn’t flinch or think it was too strong. Instead, I thought: “finally.”

In truth, finally, someone with a voice, someone who understands this club the way I feel it in my bones, someone with a profile they can’t ignore, said it exactly as it is. Not softened nor diluted and not dressed up to protect reputations that no longer deserve it.

Instead, he just said it, plainly and brutally.

What I am watching at Celtic right now is not a blip. It’s not a bad run. It’s not even isolated poor decision-making. It is something deeper, more damaging, and far more personal as a supporter. It is failure. Sustained, repeated, arrogant failure.

The worst part is that it didn’t come out of nowhere. We saw it build. I felt it creep in. This didn’t happen overnight. Instead, it developed over the past year, mistake after mistake, as those in charge ignored each one, brushed each one aside, and followed it with another, as if they genuinely believe they sit beyond consequence.

That’s what Chris Sutton was getting at. I found myself nodding. This is a pattern. A culture that gets it wrong and refuses to admit it.

That’s the part that eats at me. Not just the failures themselves, but the refusal to learn. Nobody corrects anything. Nobody takes accountability. People talk about lessons learned, but why should we believe it? How many times did we hear it?

From where I stand, nobody inside that boardroom shows any real awareness of the damage they do to the club I love.

Because if they were aware, how could we possibly be here?

How can I watch a Celtic side that feels weaker, softer, less imposing than before, especially when so much money sits in the bank? How did we go through multiple transfer windows and come out looking like a team they stripped rather than strengthened?

That’s where recruitment comes in. Or rather, the recruitment disaster.

I’ll say it straight. This has been a shambles. Sutton didn’t dance around it. He called it awful, and I can’t argue with that. Players arrive who don’t improve the starting eleven, don’t raise standards, and often don’t look suited to this level. I watch them and I don’t see hunger or quality. I don’t see that spark Celtic teams used to thrive on.

What I see is hesitation. Confusion. A squad that feels assembled without a clear plan or identity. The frightening thing is not just that the signings haven’t worked. It’s that I never felt convinced they would.

There is no sense of strategy, no visible structure behind it.

There are just names, fees, and hope.

At this level, hope is not a strategy. It’s an admission that you don’t really know what you’re doing.

Brendan clearly didn’t rate the signings and Martin was here long enough to make his own judgement on them and he didn’t want them either.

Even Nancy, who experimented with players in weird positions could not find a role for some of these players in the team.

Within all of that, one situation sums everything up.

It is the one Sutton focused on. It is the one that frustrates me most. The striker situation. Selling your main striker, your focal point, your goal source, that happens in football. I understand that. Players move on. I can accept it. What I cannot accept is what followed. Nothing.

Not in one window or in two. Not even properly in three. There is nothing that fixes the problem. Nothing that restores what was lost. We see nothing that gives me that feeling when we go forward, that belief a goal is coming.

Instead, I’m watching a side that labours. A team that looks blunt, predictable and easy to defend against. In fact, it’s a team that no longer terrifies anyone. That hurts me to say, because I know what Celtic used to do to opponents.

That’s where Sutton’s words land with full force.

Because when you knowingly weaken your team, remove a key piece and then fail, repeatedly, to replace it, while allowing that situation to drag on as the consequences play out week after week, what else can you call it?

Negligence feels too soft. Mismanagement feels too polite.

“Borderline criminal” feels about right.

You cannot create instability and expect success. You cannot disrupt and gamble at key moments, then act surprised when the team looks lost. That frustration, that disbelief, that’s exactly what Sutton captured.

And I want to make this clear. I am not putting this on the manager. That’s too easy. Because when the structure above is failing this badly, when the tools being handed down are this inadequate, I cannot expect miracles from the dugout.

Managers need real backing. Not words or promises. Not last-minute panic moves. Instead, they need proper planning, proper support and clear intent. Right now, however, we’re not seeing that.

The club talks about ambition while sitting on resources most in this country could only dream of. The money is there. That’s not the issue. Rather, the real issue is the lack of will, the lack of vision and the lack of courage to use it properly.

That contradiction drives me mad.

I’m not asking for miracles. Instead, I’m asking for competence. I want a club that behaves like it understands its own size and its responsibility to supporters like me, people who live every result, every performance, every decision.

Instead, I feel like I’m watching a slow erosion. I am watching a dismantling, piece by piece.

In fact, it feels like something much worse than neglect, and you could almost imagine it is deliberate.

That’s why Sutton’s words hit so hard. Not because they shock, but because they ring true. In other words, they capture exactly what I’ve been feeling for months.

As a result, the club must rebuild recruitment. It must bring clarity and accountability to decision-making.

Above all, leadership must return to a club that looks like it’s drifting. I keep coming back to one question.

Can the same people who created this mess be trusted to fix it?

I don’t think they can.

There is anger in me now, and I know I’m not alone in it. It hasn’t come from one moment. It’s built slowly, through repeated failures and ignored warnings, through the arrogance of people who believe they are beyond consequence.

That’s why “borderline criminal” doesn’t feel like an overreaction.

It feels like a line being drawn. A point where excuses run out and reality can no longer be ignored.

We are talking about a football club being damaged from within.

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