Celtic FC Women boss Fran Alonso spoke to The Celtic Fan Media this afternoon as he excitedly talked about his side’s Champions League debut against Levante on Wednesday. Celtic’s Spanish manager of course knows all about the Spanish side, who finished third in their league last season behind European Champions Barcelona and Real Madrid, and reckons that alongside Arsenal they were the toughest possible draw that Celtic could have got.
That said, he remains optimistic and you feel that Levante are going to have a few surprises awaiting for them from Celtic, the ONLY side in the SWPL, Alonso reminded us, to have over-performed last season. Alonso has always been creative and imaginative in the transfer market so his summer recruits are all likely to add substantially to the side, some like goalscorer Charlie Wellings have already started doing just that.
But with communication limited over the summer, with the season finishing so late due to the earlier Covid restrictions, many Celtic fans will be unaware of the details surrounding the departures of Celtic’s top goalscorer Sarah Ewens, last season’s Player of the Year and Scotland star Lisa Robertson – both leaving to sign for Birmingham City (Robertson on a season long loan deal) and Anna Filbey not signing for Celtic after her fantastic contribution in the last third of the season after joining in loan from Tottenham.
Spurs released many players while Filbey was starring in Alonso’s charge to secure the Champions League place ahead of theRangers so many Hoops fans were optimistic that the club would be able to sign the attacking midfielder on a permanent contract. Nothing materialised though and as we recently reported Anna signed up at Charlton Athletic for the new season.
Now it’s clear that unless there’s stuff we don’t know, there’s no way Alonso would ant to lose these three star performances after their brilliant contributions last season so today The Celtic Star asked Alonso what happened with each of the three players and he gave detailed, straight forward and clear explanations that are hard to argue with. Well worth a listen, ours is the final question this time around after kicking off the questioning at the earlier Fan Media Conference with Sarah Teegarden.
Incidentally we also asked Fran about the atmosphere at Celtic Park last night and what he thought of the fans being back inside the stadium and his answer to that one is also very interesting…
Watch Fran Alonso speaking to The Celtic Fan Media below…
Watch Celtic’s midfield star Sarah Teegarden speaking to the Celtic Fan Media, including The Celtic Star, below….
