DUNDEE, SCOTLAND - MARCH 22: Celtic Manager Martin O'Neill looks dejected at full time during a William Hill Premiership match between Dundee United and Celtic at the CalForth Construction Arena at Tannadice, on March 22, 2026, in Dundee, Scotland. (Photo by Craig Williamson/SNS Group via Getty Images)
Listening to the full comments from Martin O’Neill after the Celtic game hasn’t cheered me up one bit. If anything, I feel more frustrated now than I did at the final whistle, because what he said simply does not align with what we all watched unfold on that pitch.
He spoke about us being camped around their penalty area as if that was a positive. As if that was evidence that the plan was working and that we were doing the right things but just lacking a bit of sharpness or luck in the final moments. That, right there, is the problem. That is not a positive. That is a symptom of what went wrong.
We played a lot of very nice football under no pressure.
We kept the ball well, moved it around neatly, and looked comfortable in possession. But we were not a threat. Not a real one. Not in any sustained or meaningful way. There is a difference between controlling the ball and controlling a game, and what we are doing right now is the former without any of the latter.
At some point, the manager has to take responsibility for that.
When a system stops functioning, it is the job of the manager and his coaches to recognise it and change it. To try something different, to experiment, to inject life into something that has clearly gone stale. What we are watching right now is a system that is dead on its feet, and yet we continue to persist with it as if repeating the same patterns will eventually produce a different outcome.
This is not about one group of players failing. It is not about individuals having off days. We have rotated personnel all season long and the same issues keep appearing, the same lack of cutting edge, the same sterile domination of possession without any real threat. When that happens over and over again, you have to stop asking what is wrong with the players and start asking what is wrong with the system itself.
Nobody is mourning the passing of Wilfried Nancy from the dugout, and nobody is pretending that everything under him was perfect. But his football was radically different to what we are watching now, and it is worth acknowledging what it did well.
It created chances and overwhelmed defences.
It asked questions of the opposition that they struggled to answer.
We did not always have the finishing to take advantage of those chances.
There were games where players like Johnny Kenny could have won matches single-handedly with better composure in front of goal. But the opportunities were there, and that is the key point. The system created them.
It demonstrated something very simple. When you move the ball forward with pace, when there is movement off it, when you attack with intent and purpose, you stretch teams. You force defenders into decisions. You create situations they cannot fully control.
What we are doing now is the complete opposite. We are playing slow, structured, predictable football that allows the opposition to remain comfortable at all times. They are never under real pressure because we never ask them to deal with anything unexpected. We move the ball, but we do not move them.
You can see it most clearly in players like Liam Scales.
He receives the ball, looks up, and sees nothing but a bank of opposition players sitting in shape. There are no forward options that feel safe or obvious, so he plays it sideways or back. The tempo drops, the opposition resets, and we go again.
And when it does not work, we do not change it. We repeat it. That is not on the players. That is on the structure they are operating within.
Time and again, we lose the ball in the same areas. The middle third, often inside our own half, where we are overplaying and overthinking, treating possession as if it is the end goal rather than the means to one. We pass the ball around as if we are in a training exercise, waiting for something to open up instead of forcing it to open.
Meanwhile, the midfield is often too far ahead of the play, leaving gaps that require risky passes into space that can be easily closed down. The connection between defence and attack is broken, and the ball ends up drifting into areas where the opposition can step in and take it off us without much difficulty.
All day I watched us play passes into empty space, into no man’s land, with no real purpose behind them. That is not bad luck or just players making random errors. That is a system that does not function properly.
It is rigid. It lacks flexibility. More importantly, it plays to the strengths of the opposition rather than to our own. Teams know exactly what we are going to do, and they set up accordingly. They stay compact, they stay disciplined, and they wait for us to make the mistake that inevitably comes when you play without incision.
Martin O’Neill has been in the game long enough to recognise all of this. He should be able to see it unfolding in front of him. He should understand that possession without penetration is meaningless, that control without threat is an illusion.
If he does not see it, then that is a serious concern. If he does see it, then the responsibility is even greater, because it means he is choosing not to act on it.
Either way, the conclusion is the same. This system is not working, and it is not going to start working on its own. It needs to be changed, and it needs to be changed quickly, because right now it is not just failing to win us games.
It is dragging us further away from them.
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James just admit the players are shite. Utd were happy to let Scales have the the ball as they know he has no footballing ability. Those who rave about him are deluded. As for O’Neill and Maloney they are clueless about playing football with a high tempo. God forbid Maloney gets offered the job but it wouldn’t surprise me.
We were so turgid under Rodgers but he had the players to see us over the lines…
Quite clearly after today Martin simply doesn’t have…
Ach well – Not to worry…
There’s £67 million in the bank…
Not for long though !
How can they make £40 million each year they win the championship and not spend any money but still only have £60/70 million in the bank? Am I missing something?
we don’t make £40m (profit/net) every year we win the championship and we do spend money, just not often net spend and we have fixed costs like wages/buildings/power etc
Our trading surplus over a period of years is circa £70m, which is the cash in hand at the bank, but that will erode very quickly following this season.
When he came in Sean Maloney said they were just going to tweak things a little. I was hoping for a whole new approach.
I don’t blame the manager for this. He was shoehorned in, out of desperation by this boards incompetence in bringin in nancy. The real blame lies where it always has. In these charlatans, sittin in that directors box and the one away playin golf. It’s an appallin state of affairs. They’re actually reducin us tae ‘also- rans’. And even worse, against poor opposition. Thats how bad this is.
Said it in here a while back – as much as I love Martin O’Neill, his tactics are terrible. He is unable to change the way we play and every game is turgid – no wing play, stupid passes in our own penalty box, tippy tappy football when we need someone to have a bloody shot. It.Is.Rank.Rotten.
I can’t really agree with anything anyone is saying on here. Change it to what? Back to a 3-4-3 that worked so well under Nancy? How about a 3-5-2 That should work because exactly what we need is more shit strikers on the pitch. Maybe we should scour the leagues and look for more EPL players of the month from 2015 like Iheanacho or Ox to lose the ball whenever it lands on their feet. Pace? With whom? We’re back to Ralston at right back (or Reo Hatate apparently) the slowest back on Scotland the slowest team about to go to the World Cup. The reality is that MON has been a miracle worker to get us through the string of games we just survived and the minute he tried to rest a few players the bottom falls out again.
The board shat the bed in the last 3 windows and we now want to expand the playing style of the most limited players I’ve seen on Celtic in years….GTFO
Please… are you for real??? we got pumped in europe by Stuttgart who are now out. We got pumped daft by Midtjylland who James predicted were favourites to win the EL. Midtjylland subsequently got fucked over by English relegation candidates.
Why is MON a miracle worker by scraping past teams like Livi, Dundee, Kilmarnock etc?
We got pumped by Dundee Utd…not Real Madrid ffs.
I expect us to win the league but it wont be a miracle for sure!
The board must accept the vast majority of blame for the total shit show this season has been but the players have to also accept blame for the shite they have be playing this season. They should still have more than enough to beat all the teams in Scotland and to lose today was a fucking disgrace
Totally agree big Steve.
Nygren has been a good signing but today he was abysmal, I’d have subbed him after 30mins, we started ok but everything broke down with him. Donovan, Yang and McGregor were all way off it too.
With the amount of games we have left I can’t see MON changing system but I never expected to see us give up like that, the heads were down too early.
8 defeats! Fuck sake. The summer was always going to be very dangerous for us and difficult to get right, we really need to salvage what we can from this season.
Mr Mojorisin @ 12.11am…
Winning all our games (never happening by the way) will still see us needing snookers to overcome Hearts…
You are definitely more confident than I am for sure !
We haven’t had any tactics since they came.
The Board brought in very very poor loan players who wouldn’t get a game anywhere else.
Martin does himself no favours by constantly taking their side, he knows how useful they are.
The Board is a disgrace and I expect things to get worse this summer.
“Teams know exactly what we are going to do, and they set up accordingly. They stay compact, they stay disciplined, and they wait for us to make the mistake that inevitably comes when you play without incision.”
You will never write a more truer paragraph all year. Hammer. Nail. Head.
Tbf we were exactly the same ALL LAST season too but got away with it because a) we had absolutely no competition (this season, Huns and JTs are capable of stringing wins together); and b) we had a couple of matchwinners in Daizen and Khun to get us over the line.
The sideways and backwards passing horseshoe of death is a Rodgers hallmark but without any quality on the wings or a striker who can score we’re totally scunnered.
I agree with your article James, in that MON is the manager and he has the team playing turgid football! But the majority of the blame lies with the Board for their total negligence in the past few years. Although the Board is mainly to blame, the players must also accept their share of responsibility, yesterday’s performance was absolutely GUTLESS! In almost 70 years as a Celtic fan, I’m not sure how many times I’ve seen such a pathetic display from Celtic! Majority possession matters nothing if you don’t do anything with it! Roll on the end of the season! I never thought I’d say this, but I’m almost becoming embarrassed watching my beloved team this season!
I’m surprised MON hasn’t reverted to the 3-5-2 he used in his first stint. He could play Nygren as a no. 10 without people moaning that he contributes nothing in midfield.
Martin O’Neill wants to change his attitude to disciplining adults instead of weakening the team when it was already bad and sabotaging our slim title hopes. He’s scraped a few results and everyone forgot what he said about the fans who were protesting against the board. He and Maloney are as culpable as the board and Nancy for messing up.
They embarrassed the Hoops. Spineless and gutless performance. Allowed themselves to be bullied all over the park / beach.
Anyone who renews their season ticket whilst this board is in situ needs their head examined.
SACK THE BOARD