Scott Brown didn’t want to get dragged into the ongoing debates on Celtic’s Dubai Debacle after Peter Lawwell issued his Apology the Celtic Supporters video last week then Neil Lennon came out all guns blazing after his period of isolation ended and scatter-gunned anyone he could think of – including a few innocent parties like St Johnstone and Hamilton – making various allegations which do need to be looked at.
The Daily Record are saying today that the route cause of the different standard for Celtic was the seating on the bus journeys in Dubai – where Christopher Jullien sat in different seats. In Covid-hit 2021 that decision may well be the reason why four points and maybe Ten-in-a-Row was lost.
Imagine pulling the thing back, beating them twice (as we are due to, it’s long overdue) and end up losing the league by 3 points. How frustrating will that be given 4 points where shipped to Hibs and Livi by two makeshift Celtic sides.
“We all back the gaffer. I think what he said was right,” Broony said yesterday at the club’s Media Conference. You know the ones that Celtic deny Fans Media access to. “I don’t want to get too involved in the politics, that’s for the manager and chief executive.
“But for the players, it’s about doing our talking on the park and producing results for the manager,” Broony said, as reported by Scottish Sun. “We need to stick together, that’s the big one. We need to be with the manager and all on the same page.
“It’s about concentrating on ourselves, just focusing on winning all our games in hands and taking it from there. The manager loves this club. He’s been here for 20 years all in, and he knows nothing else apart from winning.He tries to drive that in to us every single day in training, whether it’s a possession drill or even five-a-sides.
“That’s the way you need to be at Celtic.
“In the last couple of months, we’ve not done that in the way we are used to, but that’s not down to the manager, that’s all of us together.”
The Celtic captain is surprised and disappointed at the lack of respect that appears to be out there among the support regarding Neil Lennon. “It’s not nice, especially with all the gaffer has done for the club.
“It’s only a month since we won the Quadruple Treble and a lot of people seem to have forgotten about it. That’s just the way it is at a big club like this, everything gets forgotten pretty quickly.
“Don’t get me wrong, the results have not been great. But what’s been done over the last nine years has been fantastic for Celtic. It’s been win after win. But we need to up our game now and help out the manager as much as we can.
“You have to look to the future and start winning matches. It’s been hard the last few games with so many players out. But we have a full squad now and we need to make sure we bounce back.”
Scott Brown is looking forward to getting back into action this evening at Livingston – kick-off is slightly later than usual at 8.15pm – and hopes that the fitness levels will be fine among the players forced to self-isolate.
“It was pretty hard doing the isolation in the house, but the lads kept themselves as fit as they possibly could.
“Here’s hoping we’ve not lost too much in terms of fitness and we’re looking forward to the game, which should be a good one for us.
“We still have belief in each other.”
Celtic really need to put Dubai to bed now and get on with picking up the pieces. The January review – promised and expected to be delivered – will tell us where the club is heading longer term and there may be wider opportunities for clubs like Celtic as a result of the Covid crisis that when the financial impact of the game is properly assessed across the world could open up the possibility of a new structure for many top teams in several leagues across Europe.
Keep an eye on what’s happening in France. No season ticket money and their TV has deal collapsed. Crisis looms and there is talk of talking their top teams and inviting clubs from neighbouring countries to join them in creating a new broadcaster friendly league. Clubs from Netherlands and Belgium could be asked and there would be logic in asking Celtic – if the broadcaster wants to sell subscriptions….
Will publish more details on this tomorrow.
