Now that I’ve slept on the Greek Tragedy, like the majority of Celtic fans I feel worse about that result this morning. Slept is loosely used. Tossed and turned.
Hindsight isn’t a wonderful thing. I can still see their goals going in and cringe just as much.
The prospect of Europa League football coupled with Sunday games fills me with apathy and dread. Many will argue that the Europa League is our level given the financial disparity between Celtic and the “Big Clubs” in the Champions League. All the same the Board’s ambitions appear to be that they are happy to take the Champions League coin from UEFA so we can’t complain, right?
I am absolutely scunnered with the Club and the gamble they’ve taken – we need to be dining at the Top Table every year. I genuinely thought we had moved on from the “Biscuit Tin” mentality. If I were Brendan Rodgers I’d be seriously p***ed off given the hard work over the past two years. It has gone swirling down the plughole.
Rodgers and his Celtic side have accumulated around £60m in Champions League money since his tenure began at Paradise, so where’s the investment in the team? We’ve collected a few quid through Van Djik and Armstrong but seem to have chosen to tart up the Stadium.
We’ve been collectively told how it would have been a great achievement to get to the group stages again but in essence we were seeded in every game and had more money available to strengthen the team than every team we could possibly draw.
Alashkert, Rosenberg and AEK Athens.
We’ve completely shot ourselves in the foot over the course of the last couple of months and at times look rudderless. Who exactly is leading the Club?
The Boyata Saga should have ended the day his agent turned up at Lennoxtown working his client’s ticket. He should have been shown the door with his tail between his legs. On top of that, McGinn should have been signed instead of posturing and posing.
It reminds me of Harry Enfield’s characters who boast about being “considerably richer than you” but lacked any real class with their exaggerated Brummie accent.
Last night requires extreme firefighting. I genuinely believe the Club as a whole are not in sync. We’re been spoon fed crap via the Marketing Team – I really could not care how much or how long a sponsorship deal is.
They’re really misunderstanding the punters here. We are the ones who lovingly part with our hard-earned cash.
We should be standing on the necks of every SPFL Club this season but instead we’ve flashed them a “keysies”. Hearts exploited our frailties last weekend and basically bullied us off the park.
We also have a Manager who heralds about improvements time and again – we are steadily getting worse. The proof is in the pudding over the last two games.
Not just in squad quality but also in results. At the tail end of last season, we were difficult to watch. The League should have been won by a margin of at least twenty points give the strength and quality of the squad.
This squad needs gutted. Last night hasn’t helped as any budget from players will be squeezed now.
We have one defender worth his salt in Kieran Tierney. Izaguirre will provide ample cover for him in times of need. Simunovic, like Boyata looks like he wants to be elsewhere. Lustig in my eyes, is done. Gamboa would have made not one iota of a difference last night frankly – he’s a squad player like Izzy but I’m sure he is thinking he could displace Lustig who’s had a big part to play in our recent malaise being at fault for AEK’s exploitation of our ropey back line.
Hendry and Ajer as I said prior to the home game would be our Achilles Heel. And unfortunately I was right. Even if Ajer was available, I think the damage would have been the same. We’ve got two “works in progress” as opposed to two experienced centre backs.
Our inability to defend cross balls or set pieces is lamentable.
My biggest bug-bear is that we’ve been complacent yet again, and not pushed for progress when undoubtedly we should have. A stronger back line and I think we would have gotten through this tie intact. The way in which we conceded in both games was God awful.
This game is now consigned to history. I really hope we can move forward and learn the harsh lesson that it is. It should prove to be a right good kick up the jacksie.
Peter Lawwell and Dermot Desmond will now have to move quickly to get us as fans onside as selling the Europa League and Sunday Football is a HUGE ask. Rodgers and his players have their parts to play too.
We really need to re-align and move forward otherwise I doubt our Manager will be here for the next year’s Qualifiers.
Gavin McCann
Boyata my arse. He has shown himself to just a greedy flag waver when it suits him.
The complete lack of urgency to fill the back line in comparison to the mid field is a joke. It was glearlngly obvious as early as last Christmas we were a cluster fk waiting to happen and happen it has. We need to drop the deadwood in both players and staff and forget about the faking hotel. 10 in a Row should have been form day one.
So it’s time for the likes of Lawwell to stick to what he is supposed to do FINANCE the new players required to keep qualifying for the CL. H. H