Well, Stephen Craigen didn’t mince any words on Premier Sports last night, did he? I’ve never been a great fan of old Craggs (as the other pundits call him) and he is certainly not a Celtic sympathiser, but he sometimes can talk sense, and last night he certainly did not miss anyone and hit the wall as far as his comments on his old club were concerned.
Motherwell were indeed a disgrace to Scotland and deserve all the flak that is coming their way. One can sympathise and accept that a provincial team can never realistically be expected to keep pace on a permanent basis with the big two in Scotland… but Sligo Rovers?
Indeed as we start the season, we can consider the plight of quite a lot of Premier League clubs. Hibs, for example, have already committed a horrendous piece of self-destruction which would have disgraced a third rate junior club.
Hearts will be all bubble and squeak for a while and may even bring off a good result or two in the first few weeks, but will soon subside back to the mediocrity (and not even that) that they showed in last May’s Scottish Cup final.
Aberdeen? Well, they looked good on TV last week (yes, yes, I know it was only Raith Rovers) and there has been an awful lot of movement both ways in the transfer market, but it is difficult to see them sustaining the pace. They also may have a few spectacularly good results (not on Sunday, we hope!) and might do well in the domestic Cup competitions, but I think we all know that the Scottish Premier League will be won by one of two clubs.
All of which raises yet again the spectre of Celtic seeing their future in somewhere other than a purely Scottish context. It is to be deplored of course, but the time may be not far away when the big two decide that their future may lie in England or a broader Atlantic League.
Or maybe they won’t. Maybe they enjoy the present set-up. Winning 10 League titles out of 11 is good, and there have been a good few Cup successes as well.
But not in Europe. Celtic’s European record over the past 20 years has not been great. A few good games, but far too often defeats to the not so mighty men of Utrecht, Happoel Tel Aviv, Sion, Cluj and the three teams that begin with M – Maribor, Molde and Malmo. Oh, it horrifies me to think of some of these disgraces!
So Ange and the merry men, can you change this? Can you bring Celtic out of the mire of European mediocrity that Scotland seems to be wallowing in? Yes, I want 11 out of 12 League titles, a 41st Scottish Cup aand a 21st League Cup, but we also need a significant presence tin Europe. Otherwise, the spectre of Celtic leaving Scottish football – something that terrifies me as a football historian – may not go away.
David Potter
