GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - NOVEMBER 30: Celtic's Luke McCowan celebrates after scoring to make it 2-0 during a William Hill Premiership match between Celtic and Ross County at Celtic Park, on November 30, 2024, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Ross MacDonald/SNS Group via Getty Images)
Yesterday, James Forrest got his new Celtic deal, and anyone who read the piece I wrote about it will know how unimpressed I was.
It is not that the player himself has nothing left to offer us. He clearly does. The problem is that no manager out of the last three has treated him seriously as a key member of the team. All of them have preferred to use him as an impact sub. It may be, as Martin O’Neill says, that the concerns were about his fitness. But if that is the case, giving him a one-year contract makes even less sense.
Because I know that Forrest can still make an impact, and because I know he can still be a valuable member of this team if managers want to use him properly, I am more comfortable with that deal than I am with the rumour that we might be in talks with Luke McCowan about a new one.
That one, I can’t understand at all.
Luke McCowan has been a decent squad player. But that is it. In a transfer window where the wide expectation is that we will sell Reo Hatate and Arne Engels, the idea that we are offering a new deal to McCowan, the weakest member of the midfield group, is frankly terrifying.
That includes Paulo Bernardo, by the way. I would start him before McCowan every single time.
Listen, I have gone through little spells where I have really liked Luke McCowan in a Celtic shirt. But the fact that I am talking about little spells, and the fact that almost all of us would be talking about little spells and little moments, is pretty much the whole case. I don’t even need to sell it particularly hard. Everyone knows he will never be anything but a squad player.
He will never be anything but the guy you bring on so you can take someone else off and give them 20 minutes of rest at the end of a difficult match. You are not asking Luke McCowan to start those games. Not any of them.
He is a classic example of everything that is wrong with the current thinking at Celtic.
There are too many players here who are far below the level required to be first-team regulars. We keep them around simply because they are warm bodies. Simply because you can bring them on in an emergency or draft them into the team when there is no alternative.
Other than that, they would not be near the building.
That is a dreadful use of club resources. It is a dreadful use of a squad place. It also creates the false impression of depth, when in fact we don’t really have depth at all.
Luke McCowan is a player who has used every ounce of the talent God gave him in a positive and commendable manner. Players with more talent than McCowan never made it to Celtic because of one thing or another. Attitude. Inconsistency. Arrogance. Chasing money. Whatever it was, better players never got here. They never reached this level. They never played Champions League football or experienced Champions League nights.
He is to be admired and respected for that accomplishment.
But the idea that he might be one of the last men standing in this midfield after we have asset-stripped it yet again, and before we start rebuilding the next one, is frightening. For all we know, that rebuild is going to start with the signing of a Hibs player.
If that is the future of this team, then based on what the captain said yesterday, he is absolutely wasting his time ending his career here. He may as well go now and know that he saw the best of it.
Because what we are gearing up for is not the next evolution.
It is the next regression, the next phase of the strategy we call managed decline.
It will be managed decline for no reason.
We do not need to be building a midfield around Luke McCowan and a player from Hibs. What club with our resources should even be thinking in those terms? It is pretty scandalous if that is the kind of foundation on which we intend to build this next Celtic team.
With all respect to him, McCowan is one of those players, along with Johnny Kenny and Anthony Ralston, who this club needs to move on in the summer. These are the guys who prove the point that you are only as strong as your weakest link.
I don’t see that they have a future here unless it is the kind of future that none of us want.
I know there will be the usual wails that McCowan is a good player, that he should be in the team more often and all the usual stuff. I’m not even interested in debating that. Football professionals disagree. Football professionals don’t start him every week.
So the only question becomes this: are there better players out there who we could get, players who could provide stronger competition and make a larger impact when they are in the team?
The obvious answer is yes. Everyone knows the answer is yes.
Luke McCowan is an SPFL-level player. He is far below the standard of player who would get into our midfield every week and stay there. If you are at this club beyond this season and you cannot meet that standard, then what the hell is the point?
Competition for places at Celtic should be fierce, and he provides none. He is a backup, like so many others in this squad. If we do not look for an upgrade the second a new manager walks through the door, I will be astonished.
The club should not tie that manager’s hands by handing out new deals.
He must decide who meets the standard and who does not.
If McCowan gets a new deal, then maybe our future really does lie in signing Motherwell players and Hibs players. Maybe the definition of Celtic class has changed. Maybe we should start getting used to what that new definition looks like.
I don’t know about you, but I’m not quite ready to do that yet.
Even if some of the people at this club are.
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Couldn’t agree more.Luke has lived his dream, playing and scoring for Celtic, but he is not a Celtic midfield starter.I dread to think what the future holds for us if this board remains.
Even if we win the double our future looks terrifying. offering contracts before a manager is in place and not knowing what European competition we will be playing in.
You really couldn’t make this situation up.
“Even if we win the double…”
That gave me a good chuckle, steve.
RC, we are the only team that can win the double and I am expecting us to do just that.
I for one will be ckuckling unreservedly during our celebrations 🙂
chuckling even
I will GLADLY be proved wrong.
Has the new 5 year bumper deal for Balikwisha been announced yet?
Balikwho? I truly forgot he was still with us. That’s how much of an impact he’s made.
I have been reading and enjoying your blog for quite some time now and I generally agree with you but in this instance I don’t. I don’t understand the attitude of Celtic fans towards McCowan. He was one of the subs that came on in the last couple of games who helped change the game. He’s positive, drives forward and takes a shot at goal if the chance presents itself; things the fans have been crying out for. The managers have not wanted to play him! Following that rationale why do you prefer Bernardo as the managers do not want or did not want to play him either. We also need a certain number of Scottish players. It appears to me that a lot of fans are quick to ‘worship’ some foreign players, that they know nothing about, when they are signed only to be disappointed when they leave without a backward glance.
This stinks of them (the board) acting as though the next manager is already at Celtic.
If that’s true then it’s either MON or Maloney (FFS!).
Either way they’ve learned absolutely nothing.
And they’re showing no signs of learning anything.
Apart from Jamesy Forrest, a modern day legend who deserves everything he is being offered from the Club he loves, no one else should be given new contracts until a new manager has been appointed and he has approved those said contracts.
Totally agree we should not be offering new contracts to any player until the new manager has seen the players but thats now this fucking board work. Fill the squad with cheap options and tae fuck with hiw it turns out. I like Luke McCowan but he hasn’t shown enough for me to be kept on- and I am very much a sentimental Celtic fan that everyone deserves their chance.
Too many players have shown they aren’t up to it so need to get rid
Im shiteing myself for next season and this shite one hasn’t even finished.
But the board need ro realise wjwt a total shambles they are
Totally agree we should not be offering new contracts to any player until the new manager has seen the players but thats now this fucking board work. Fill the squad with cheap options and tae fuck with hiw it turns out. I like Luke McCowan but he hasn’t shown enough for me to be kept on- and I am very much a sentimental Celtic fan that everyone deserves their chance.
Too many players have shown they aren’t up to it so need to get rid
Im shiteing myself for next season and this shite one hasn’t even finished.
But the board need ro realise wjwt a total shambles they are
James, I read that you would play Bernardo before McCowan “every single time” and that was enough for me to know that it was going to be a diatribe talking down Scottish players. Bernardo hasn’t kicked a ball all season. He’s had his chances especially earlier this season and gave us nothing.
It would seem to me that you are one of our crowd who would play any half decent foreign player before a decent Scottish or Irish guy.
Yep McCowan is a decent squad player as you state, so if he is willing to sign a contract which reflects being a squad player, why wouln’t you sign him up on a new contract.
No squad in the SPL even the Celtic squad is going to be full of top class players sitting on the bench.
As for McCowan, when he does come on he very seldom let’s us down, and I would bet that his wages do not nearly match Hatate, who has only turned up now and again this season or Bernardo who hasn’t turned up at all.
Of course we are hoping we sign a few players with a really good level of ability in the summer, especially if Engels,Hatate and Maeda move on, but my idea of a squad player for Celtic in the SPL, is more realistic than some of the fantasists who seem to think that European players are queuing up to sit on the bench for Celtic, After what we’ve brought in from the continent this season, I’d have been happier with one or two of the Scottish boys in January.
Our bread and butter is the SPL, Aye hopefully we can do a bit better in Europe and consistently reach the top 20, we can do that with a decent squad, aye even with some decent Scottish squad players.
Bodo Glimt are in the top 20 at the moment with a team mostly of Norwegians. They have proved that better coaching can take you there.
I think, James we have bigger fish to fry and we need to focus on the next five games. I would love it if you and the others started a concerted campaign to weed out the back passing and lack of effort for the the last 80 minutes of any game. I was shocked when the fans booed Schmeichel but perhaps, while not the Celtic way, it was necessary and he has not been picked since and if you believe he is injured I have a some magic beans to sell.
The fans have begun to groan at the negative play and it looks like it is helping.
I remember there used to be a phrase that was used and that was he has “put himself into contention ” which indicated the hard working would be rewarded but Celtic have lost that when Rodgers took over and continued to play the same team and tactics week in week out. It is is disease and the club is still suffering from it as it instils fear of change. Nancy changed things but it has to be the right change.
Leicester are heading for the wilderness because of the poison Rodgers instilled in his time there and it is only a matter of time until he is found out in his new arena.
Mon will start the same bunch of chancers tomorrow it is up to the fans to ensure he doesn’t finish with them.
Luke’s a squad player who always raises the tempo when he comes on, driving and passing forward at every opportunity.
He was a major part of last week’s turnaround, replacing the ineffective Engels, scoring the clinching 4th goal and providing an assist for Ineacho.
So you want to leave the club with no Scot’s whatsoever in the squad? Good luck with that objective!
I don’t really know where to begin with this. The lack of understanding for the need for Scottish players as part of the squad for Europe, the reality of attracting high quality players to Scotland to sit on the bench, the dismissive attitude towards Scottish players in general.
Both Ange and BR were in my opinion poor at rotating their squad which resulted in over-played players leading to more injuries and a predictable and tired way of playing week in, week out (remember we only squeezed past ICT in the Scottish Cup final).
Is the squad player replacing the first choice in a Cup Final/Euro match/big league game? – of course not. But someone like McCowan is more than capable of playing in grind of the SPFL to allow us to rest the first choice every now and again. And with more game time through more sensible rotation, the backups would be more “on the pace” when called upon.
Brilliant to hear Luke has a deserved new contract – never in doubt!