Fran Alonso is a manager that will forever hold a place in the hearts of many Celtic fans. He and the Ghirls brought attention to women’s football, bringing in record crowds at Celtic Park and winning the Scottish Cup at the national stadium.
Fran departed Glasgow in December to take up the role of head coach at Houston Dash. He still has lots of great things to say about the club, and he spoke about some of his brilliant Celtic memories in an interview with the BBC Scotland’s Behind the Goals podcast.
The ex-Celtic manager did not manage to lift the SWPL league trophy during his tenure, but he says that lifting the Scottish Cup at Hampden last season is one of the best experiences in his entire career. Speaking on Behind the Goals, Fran Alonso talked about his time at Celtic and the toughest decision of his career in opting to leave Celtic to take the job at Houston.
“When I think about that game, I still feel goosebumps. I’ve been in football since 2012 but I’ve never experienced what I experienced that day. Not in the Premier League, not in the Women’s Super League. It is not about the number of fans there, but the atmosphere, the singing, the flags, non-stop for 90 minutes.
“That was why I was deflated we could not deliver the championship. It is heartbreaking every time I think about that, but we won everything else. We didn’t leave empty-handed and the final against our biggest rivals made up for it a bit.”
The charismatic Spaniard touched on the problems he was presented with at Celtic: “The problem for me was how ineffective we were about retaining the quality players we produced. I was there four years, and we lost our top goalscorer every year while (the)Rangers or Glasgow City would not lose theirs.”
Despite his understandable concerns, it wasn’t an easy decision: “I was happy at Celtic. You always want more, but I was very happy with what we were achieving and how the future looked, but if you are in women’s football, the American league is the best in the world, the most competitive.
“That’s the aspiration and Houston has the weather, the structure of their club. So, I made the decision, but it was a very hard decision.
“My family were sad. My parents had become Celtic fans. Now, the sadness is slowly disappearing, and the excitement is growing even more. It’s an opportunity for me to grow and learn. It’s going to be a challenge but a beautiful challenge.”
Fran, who was still in Glasgow awaiting his visa to travel to the United States, talked through the first two matches for his successor Elena Sadiku’s first two games in charge, losing to both theRangers and Glasgow City having talked about his frustrations at failing to retain his top goalscorer every single season he was at the club. Celtic’s budget is less than half that of theRangers and significantly lower than Glasgow City’s. So when you consider his achievements that were all earned on a shoestring – a League, Cup, two Scottish Cups, two Champions League qualifications and coming within a minute of winning the league title, it’s all the more remarkable.
The NWSL will kick off on 16 March, so keep an eye out for Fran on the touchline. He will be looking to improve Houston Dash’s league performance after they finished in 10th place last season. This Behind the Goals podcast was recorded a week ago, and Fran was hopeful that his visa would arrive this week, so hopefully he’s got away and can get to work at his new club.
Closer to home, the Celtic FC Women are back in action on Wednesday evening, 7th February, against Motherwell in the Scottish Women’s Premier League. The game will be played at K Park Training Academy and will kick-0ff at 8.pm.
