The dust has settled on one of the most extraordinary Annual General Meetings in Celtic’s modern history, however the fallout is only beginning…
What was supposed to be the club’s annual moment of accountability turned instead into a spectacle of tension, miscommunication, and deepening mistrust. What we witnessed was not a disagreement between a board and its fans, it was the public unveiling of a fundamental rupture in how Celtic views itself, how it is governed, and what it aspires to be.
The club now stands at a crossroads, and at that crossroads sits a pretty uncomfortable truth, the people running Celtic and the people supporting Celtic no longer appear to be talking about the same club. This is a long game. But it is also a turning point.
AGMs are normally procedural, predictable, a day of mostly mild questions and routine votes. But this year, Celtic arrived knowing they were walking into a room full of frustrated shareholders and supporters who had spent months seeking answers to basic questions about strategy, governance, ambition, and communication.
These questions did not arrive overnight. They were posed publicly in early October by the Celtic Fans Collective -what is the club’s long-term football strategy, why were obvious weaknesses not addressed in the transfer market, what accountability exists for repeated recruitment failures, how will the football department be modernised to compete in Europe, and why does the club resist meaningful collaboration with supporters on matchday experience, ticketing and atmosphere.
These are not revolutionary demands, they are standard corporate governance questions asked of any serious sporting organisation. Yet five of the seven remain unanswered. And when the one day arrived in the year when those answers could be delivered in a structured forum, the AGM, the board did not deliver them. Not in their remarks, not in the video presentations, and not in the Q&A, which was avoided. Instead, we witnessed something else entirely.
There will be some who insist the meeting was disrupted, that fans behaved poorly, that a small minority prevented a productive session. It is not unreasonable to acknowledge that the meeting was heated, loud, confrontational, and full of genuine frustration. But AGMs for underperforming PLCs often are. Boisterousness is not disruption, dissatisfaction is not sabotage and shareholders asking for answers is not disorder. The deeper issue was not the room’s volume, it was the board’s inability, or unwillingness, to manage it.
The signs were visible early. The CEO and CFO did not speak beyond their video presentations. A shareholder who asked to skip the video to allow more time for Q&A had her microphone cut. Her request, a procedural one, was neither relayed to the hall nor put to a vote. The meeting was abruptly adjourned for thirty minutes. When they returned, the videos were played anyway and the lost time was not restored. At that stage, it became clear to everyone in the room that the top table had no intention of facing prolonged questioning. When a board begins its AGM by minimising shareholder interaction and ends it by shutting the meeting down, it is difficult to argue that the issue was disruption. Many concluded the issue was avoidance.
The most remarkable moment of the day came not through debate or dialogue, but through a speech delivered on behalf of Dermot Desmond.
It was accusatory, defensive, framed as clarity but landing as something closer to exasperation. And here is the tell, every accusation aimed at supporters reflected a deeper anxiety within the club. The speech claimed supporters “lie in wait” to stir toxicity, even as the frustration in the room was a direct response to what shareholders saw as years of poor decision-making and a lack of transparency.
It suggested critics were “anti-establishment,” a strange charge for a club whose identity is founded on resisting establishment power. It spoke of responsibility and prudence, yet avoided acknowledging what mistakes were actually made. It attempted to reframe the crisis as the result of one transfer window and restless fans, despite years of repeated early European exits, failed recruitment cycles, and avoidable operational errors.
And crucially, it presented Europe as a financial impossibility rather than a strategic challenge, pointing to global football inflation while ignoring the long list of smaller clubs who have overtaken Celtic on the continental stage.
This was not a statement of confident leadership, it was a statement that betrayed insecurity. It was not a rebuttal of criticism, it was a confirmation that criticism had been heard and rejected. In short, the accusations read like confessions.
Across all official communications, the video, the AGM speeches, and the subsequent statement, Celtic repeatedly emphasised that “mistakes have been made.” But which mistakes? What lessons were learned? What structural changes will be made? What is the plan to avoid these mistakes in future?
On all of this, the club chose silence. Celtic confirmed error in the abstract but refused specificity in the concrete. And without specificity, “we made mistakes” becomes an empty phrase, a rhetorical seatbelt with no buckle. It restrains nothing.
This is why supporters feel misled, not because they disagree with the idea of prudence, but because the club invokes prudence without articulating purpose. Not because they demand wild spending, but because the board keeps pretending that is the argument. The club has created a false binary choice, recklessness or stagnation. Supporters reject that framing entirely. What they seek is a strategy, not a shopping spree.
There is a mythology now forming around the discontent, that supporters are demanding every penny be put into transfers, or that fans want Celtic to chase an impossible dream. This is not true.
Supporters have been clear, they want communication, they want to understand the long-term plan, they want recruitment to be part of a continuous football strategy, not a twice-a-year scramble, they want to know what Celtic aim to be in Europe, they want transparency around decision-making, and they want governance that reflects the size and stature of the club.
If the club wishes to prioritise stadium expansion or infrastructure, supporters overwhelmingly agree. If the club chooses to invest more in analytics or facilities than transfer fees, supporters will accept that. If the board believes the European landscape has shifted dramatically, fans will engage. But the club must say so. They must explain the reasoning. They must outline the vision. They must articulate the ambition. Right now, none of that is happening, and into that vacuum, mistrust grows.
Perhaps the most concerning element of the AGM was the sense that Celtic is no longer functioning under a balanced corporate structure. The influence of a single non-executive director, publicly underscored by the prominence of his statement and the absence of others, has begun to overshadow the executive team. This is not healthy governance, this is not transparency, this is not stability.
Celtic is a PLC, it should not drift toward the culture of a personal fiefdom. When Brendan Rodgers left, the public fallout was unmissable. When the Green Brigade were sanctioned, many saw it as divide-and-rule. Now, shareholders at an AGM have been framed in similar terms. Patterns matter, and the pattern here is unmistakable. When challenged, Celtic responds not with engagement but with defensiveness, not with dialogue but with deflection, not with strategy but with narrative control.
Tonight, the Celtic Fans Collective will meet. What emerges from that meeting will likely set the tone for the months ahead.
What is clear is the support now recognises this is a long game. Change will not happen through one angry meeting or one emotional speech. Change, if it is to occur, will come from organisation, unity, and strategic pressure.
A ticket boycott for instance, previously unthinkable, can no longer be dismissed. Because the club has now publicly stated that its ambition is to win domestically and that its measure of European success is simply qualifying. If European football is now an exercise in participation rather than progression, the natural question arises, why should supporters feel compelled to participate financially without reciprocal ambition? This is the existential question Celtic now faces, not from rivals, not from journalists, but from its own people.
Historically, Celtic has always believed itself to be something bigger, larger in imagination, larger in aspiration, larger in cultural significance. But the AGM revealed something startling, Celtic’s leadership now appears content to be a Scottish club with Scottish ambitions. Stay slightly ahead of theRangers, qualify for a European group, take no risks, make no leaps, avoid the swing in case we miss. Minimal ambition, maximum stability. It is a coherent model, but it is not Celtic’s model. It never has been. If that is the future, it must be stated plainly. If it is not, the strategy must be explained. Right now we have neither.
If one thing emerged clearly from the AGM, it is that Celtic is being shaped around the vision of one man, not a board, not an executive, not a collective stewardship. One person’s beliefs, one person’s risk appetite, one person’s idea of what Celtic is and what Celtic should be. And that vision, articulated through a defensive speech delivered by proxy, appears to reject ambition, reject scrutiny, and reject the concerns of the supporters. Supporters now face a choice, accept that vision, or fight for another.
What happens next will define Celtic for years, because a club of Celtic’s size, history, and identity cannot thrive on participation alone. It cannot be a global institution with local ambition, and it cannot sustain itself on a governance model that resists accountability.
Whatever comes from tonight’s meeting, whatever actions follow, whatever long-term strategy the support pursues, the essential truth has already been revealed, Celtic supporters know now, without ambiguity, that change will not come from the top down. It must come from the bottom up.
The AGM showed us the future the board sees. The next months will reveal the future the supporters are willing to accept.
Niall J
Last orders for Celtic in the Eighties by David Potter
Last remaining copies of Celtic in the Eighties – get your copy now before it’s too late! Here’s what you get…
- David Potter’s beautifully produced hardback book, the Celtic Historian final work before his passing. Your copy will also be personally signed by Celtic legend Danny McGrain!
- You’ll also receive a complimentary copy of another brilliant David Potter book – Willie Fernie – Putting on the Style.
Order Celtic in the Eighties from Celtic Star Books and we’ll automatically add Putting on the Style. Please note postage will only be charged on one book so there is no cost to you at all for the Willie Fernie biography.
These two books combined will make a brilliant Christmas present!
When are the CFC going to recognise that the fans’ survey wants the green brigade out? Why did the CFC disrupt the meeting for their own ends, why can’t they conduct themselves with a degree of intelligence and how do the Celtic supporters hold the CFC to account? Why did they elect themselves as a fan voice that doesn’t actually listen to the majority of the fans?
Desmond and Lawwell obviously do already treat the club as their own fiefdom – and the supporters with disdain.
That’s been obvious for some time but never as clearly indicated as just lately when Desmond, a non-executive Board member was allowed to use the club’s public information site to publish his unprecedented, personal, attack against the ex-manager – and this was just subsequent to the Club announcing the manager’s departure, thanking him for his services. He didn’t just undermine the CEO and Board but made the club a laughing stock.
The fact that the non-executive Chairman, CEO and other Board members then allowed the same individual, through his son, to use the AGM to vilify and insult supporters/shareholders serves to further demonstrate that the Board are mostly useless puppets with little or no real say in anything.
Lawwell, as a non-executive Chairman, also clearly demonstrated how unfit he is to be in that role – being complicit in allowing Desmond’s inappropriate statement to be read out at the AGM and his handling of the AGM generally – losing his head, sneering arrogance and totally lacking in any semblance of the maturity, common sense and diplomacy, normally associated with such a role.
It would appear, therefore, that Lawwell runs the Board as a dictatorship (his arrogant manner in dealing with supporters, alone, is shocking) and that Desmond, albeit owning 34.7% of shares in the club, is allowed to do whatever he wants and acts as if he actually owns the club.
Niall, you may have become a big noise for the collective at present. But until some form of organisation is formed, then personally regarding the likes as nothing more than a disruptive rabble, who stand to do more harm to our club, than any good imo?
Without being able to form a committee, then to many factions exists, with there own agendas in existence.
Yet all the collective is doing, is defending the likes with such behaviour?
The collective may have valid points, that are worthy of answers, but answers won’t be found with personal attacks and disruptive behaviour in operation whatsoever imo?
No-one is going to engage with anyone, especially if yob culture is in operation.
Answers won’t be found if no form of dialogue can be achieved.
And disruptive actions will not achieve anything for ourselves, especially if they are trying to be promoted as a genuine success imo?
Personally believe that the collective needs a rethink, if they want to be taken seriously.
Starting with trying to become more constructive than disruptive would be a start.
Forgetting about the achievements and success gained within the dominance of Scottish football, shows a total lack of disrespect that has been gained.
European football is becoming a way bigger challenge with Scottish football getting left behind, especially without any form of a development programme in operation.
I’m all for, trying to get a footballing strategy in place for ourselves, but fail to see how the likes will be achieved, while we are operating as such an unwelcoming club, as we seem to be at present imo.
So maybe the collective needs to start getting it’s own house in order, before it thinks about trying to tackle the bigger guns within our club imo?
And remain doubtful that can be even achieved, to be taken more seriously?