Wrong Again, Jacko!
Morning,all.
I had the pleasure of another visit to Celtic Park on Sunday, and I have to say it was time well spent. Obviously because of the family and friends that I was with, but also the performance and the result. Everything from back to front was a pleasure to watch, and much anticipated beforehand when we saw the team.
At the back, we had the return of AJ. No offence to Big T, but AJ is our right back and he let us know it. Scalesy kept his place, and Valle got a well-deserved runout. Up front, kinda sruggling for choice due to injuries, Yang got another go at the right wing berth. But much as I really want the guy to succeed, I’m of the opinion that he can’t quite hack it.
Maeda was Maeda, we ain’t gonna change him, and to be honest, the same could be said for Kyogo. Try as much as you like, they play how they play and do what they do.
As MAHE mentioned yesterday, the big deal was in midfield. CalMac was given a rare day off, which meant Reo, Arne and Paolo in midfield. And boy, did they make hay. But, as I said, this has already been covered,so let’s move on.
Sunday’s result meant that we had only lost twice in 2024, an achievement which we should recognise. No, it isn’t quite up there with the Invincible Season, of course not. But I saw a graph of our number of losses since Fergus took over, and the previous record was only six defeats. It also includes some really surprising numbers from the likes of arch-pragmatist WGS with 13. Even more surprising is that Postecoglu had the same number in 2021, though that is obviously skewed with the couple of months of Lennon at the start of the year.
What cannot be disputed is the twelve defeats in 2018, which is BR Mk I. His last year with us. Has he learned that pragmatism, or is he still going gung-ho due to the gap in quality between us and the rest of Scottish football? I don’t know, and I genuinely don’t care either. As long as I’m allowed a wee smirk every so often.
The next game is on Thursday, which is the first match of The New Year. I know that you are all looking forward to it as much as I am, and I’ll preview it on the day. Not much point really in any of us pretending otherwise. Not so much do or die, as shit or bust for the huns. I can’t wait.
Less than a week after the senior football writer in the Daily Record told us that the title race was back on, Keith Jackson was forced to eat some humble pie. Some going, Keith. Last week you had to eat humble pie because you’d been telling us all for months that Clement was a dud but hey, maybe not-then lo and behold you had to eat another large portion because you were right all along! Tough gig…
Me,well. A fourteen point lead going into 2025 is just fine and dandy. No lead is ever big enough as far I’m concerned. But you know what? As long as it isn’t 3-3 and another moral victory for them on Thursday, I’ll be happy enough.
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Above article by BMCUWP
POTY Competition Update.
*SENTINEL CELTS PLAYER OF THE YEAR 2024-25*
*RESULTS FROM GAME #28 CELTIC 4 ST JOHNSTONE 0 (KUHN, KYOGO(2), MEADA)*
Good evening, friends.
Another emphatic victory brought the curtain down on a quite incredible 2024 as St Johnstone were, quite literally blown away.
From the first whistle there seemed to be an urgency about our team that has perhaps been missing in previous games. And no one did more than Arne Engels who, in the first half hour seemed to be absolutely everywhere, linking up play, recovery tackles, creating chances and almost finishing a couple. But it was his fellow midfielder Reo Hatate who created the breakthrough on the half hour mark with a fine pass into the space ahead of Kuhn. Our German here made no mistake, cutting inside and placing a firm shot into the corner of the net.
5 minutes later and Nicolas almost had his second with one of his trademark curling efforts towards the top corner. Rae in the St Johnstone goal did well to fingertip it over the bar.
Early in the second half we thought Celtic had doubled their lead when Johnston fired in a low cross that a St Johnstone defender turned into his own net. But Kyogo was found to have been offside earlier in the build up and the goal was correctly disallowed.
But on 59 minutes we did get our second goal. Bernardo laid a side pass to Hatate and then charged into the busy box to get on the end of Hatate’s beautiful chip. Goal of the season was denied by the keeper but his parry was met by the head of Kyogo and it was 2 nil. 5 minutes later and Kyogo had his second goal. This time a peach of a right foot curling delivery with pace from Engels and Kyogo met it cleanly on the 6 yard line to give the keeper no chance.
The final goal of the afternoon was scored by Daizen Maeda. Again, a brilliant defence splitting pass from Bernardo into Daizen’s path and a left foot finish across the goalkeeper and our scoring for the day was completed.
What was very noticeable yesterday was that all 3 of our starting midfielders made creative passes that led to our 4 goals. Hatate for the first 2, Engels for the 3rd and Bernardo for our 4th. Long may that continue.
14 points clear with 20 games to go. And hopefully about to be 17 ahead with 19 remaining. As Archie was fond of saying, wooooft!!
We have now played 28 games this season, winning 21, drawing 6 and losing just the 1. We have scored 79 and conceded 20 (domestically it’s 69-10 and in Europe it’s 10-10).
Thanks as always to the 70 who voted this time around. The total votes cast for each player are as follows, with my own nominations asterisked.
Schmeichel: 0
Johnston: 6
Carter-Vickers: 4
Scales*: 6
Valle: 15
Bernardo: 38
Engels*: 60
Hatate: 12
Kuhn*: 47
Kyogo: 17
Yang: 3
Idah: 0
McGregor: 0
Maeda: 2
McCowan: 0
Ralston: 0
And so, the players receiving POINTS for the game against St Johnstone are –
Engels – 5 Points (that’s 2 MOTMs in a row)
Kuhn – 4 points
Bernardo – 3 points
Kyogo – 2 points
Valle – 1 point
And the overall positions after 28 games played are –
47 points – Kuhn
41 points – Bernardo, Scales
36 points – Hatate
34 points – Maeda
33 points – McGregor
32 points – Schmeichel
28 points – Engels
22 points – Trusty
21 points – Johnston A
17 points – Carter-Vickers
16 points – McCowan
15 points – Valle
13 points – Kyogo
11 points – Taylor
7 points – O’Riley
5 points – Idah
4 points – Forrest
3 points – Welsh
1 point – Yang
0 points – Holm, Johnston M., Nawrocki, Palma, Ralston, Turley
*PLAYER OF THE MONTH FOR DECEMBER*
The monthly award is based simply on the total votes received over that particular month. During December we had 7 games. There were 5 in the league (home to Hibs, Motherwell and St Johnstone and away to Aberdeen and Dundee Utd), an away European tie (Dinamo Zagreb) and a neutral venue for our League Cup success (Triggers Broom FC).
Third place with 139 votes is Cameron Carter-Vickers whilst the runner up on 154 was Paulo Bernardo. But the winner this month 198 votes is Kasper Schmeichel.
Monthly winners –
August – Calum McGregor 184
September – Paulo Bernardo 173
October – Liam Scales 168
November – Nicola Kuhn 298
December – Kaspar Schmeichel 198
Our next game is Tuesday’s Glasgow Derby. We travel to Ibrox for the 3.00pm kick off in a pretty good place!
Hail Hail!
Great read this morning BMCUWPS.
Happy New Year everyone when it comes.
I’m heading out atm.
BMCUWPS,
Could you do me a favour? If Lost in Transit makes an appearance, can you ask him if he has any spares for Thursday?
He hasn’t been seen since the weekend. I presume he’s still giving it laldy doon the Gallowgate after the weekend?
Thanks in advance.
Happy New Year.
THEGOMBEENMAN
Will do!
Hh
Bobby
Great stuff.
Good to catch up with ye and few of the Bhoys yesterday..
Hoping it didn’t get too messy around T -time 🥳
SeS
It was a rare pleasure,mate. Great company,great pub-what could possibly go wrong?
Well,nothing as it turned out.
Welcome back,TAL. Apology accepted.
Although the on field performances are rightly the main focus of SC I tend to look behind the Celtic performance scenario for factors that impact over a longer term on performance. The impact of FSR football earnings on squad quality for example.
In that spirit I offer the following on the interdepedent nature of the football industry.
It is not something I make up to defend The Board a filter that diverts from the issue, it is simply a factor that.might lead to a wider understanding of thinking at any Board or SFA/
SPFL/UEFA level.
I don’t expect folks to like what it leads to just to appreciate more what differentiates football as an industry from other industries.
If not of interest just scroll past.
https://europeanleagues.com/wp-content/uploads/REPORT-THE-FINANCIAL-LANDSCAPE-OF-EUROPEAN-FOOTBALL.pdf
Morning all a hot 37 degrees here today looking forward to Thursday and wee Kyogo scoring 2, same starting 11 for me as against St Johnstone hope everyone has a great New Year.
lang may yer lum reek
Good way to end the year, Bobby, by recognizing how awesome we have been for 12 months.
The thing I’ve been impressed by most is how well our defence has played this season so far.
To have only lost 4 league goals is absolutely tremendous.T
And you can always tell when Celtic have all the cylinders firing at the same time,, we suddenly become a troll free zone …funny that!
hale hale! The show ain’t far away.
POB,
We have sideways rain and freezing gale force winds! Not jealous or anything.
MOTHERWELL were wrongly denied a goal against Rangers yesterday, according to the SFA’s Key Match Incident (KMI) panel
Must be a replay…….8 mean the whole of Europe is talking about it….
Steven McLean was VAR who told Clancy it was a foul
Rooney “mutualled” at Plymouth.
K-TAL,
good man 👏
TGM,
If there’s anywhere that Mitch can get you tickets, I’m guessing Ibrox would be the place 😉
BADABING
I’ve long said McLean is the worst of them. Proves it every time. I wonder if he’ll be rested for the next round of matches?
POB
37° would be torture for me,but I’d happily settle for halfway between your temperature and ours!
Bada,
Big Phil will surely be asking the media to investigate that, eh
The officiating at Fir Park was as blatant as anything i have ever witnessed in all the time I’ve been watching Scottish football. There was absolutely no attempt to even hide it! A half lasts 45mins and Clancy played nearly an extra 14mins!!! And if there was a foul in the box it was Butland pushing Tony Watt!!
One of those world’s biggest mysteries has to be the fact the Huns believe they are somehow being cheated! They have had a full 30mins added in their last two games …THIRTY MINUTES!! 😳
Auldheid,
Within Scottish football there is one financial superpower : Celtic.
That position has been achieved by “organic growth,” a committed support and the sustainable business approach adopted by the Board.
Any move to artificially develop a competitive model by tinkering with the league system is a move likely to gain greatest support from those who cheated for years.
It will kill football in Scotland.
Scotland has in excess of 1 million folk over 65 years of age. We can’t sustain more than one or two clubs who with the resources to compete at today’s top level.
The sensible approach is to stop trying to undermine what Peter Lawwell and Celtic have achieved but to encourage other clubs in the league to adopt often unpopular decisions that have a longer-term approach.
Sustainable, organic growth. Mergers, cost cutting and transparency.
The landscape of global football is changing.
There’s no going back to Ally’s Tartan Army or Ernie Walker.
Back to the grindstone.
BAD
We were talking before the game on Sunday about how the huns reckon the referees are part of the Insee Fenian Hand. After we’d stopped laughing,of course.
We came to the conclusion that the refs might eventually feel hard done to by their brethren,and start giving them something to complain about-by officiating properly!
Rumours on social media saying that Tav no pen is out for Thursday game, guessing he’s not up for Maeda destroying him yet again.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/fiCUM9SKVcHsazQ47
Morning all,
Great afternoon yesterday 👍
The LurkinTim
SeS
BMCUW
BRRB
Leggy.
And….. Not a bad joke in sight 😁😁
Hope everyone has a great night tonight 💚
C76 11.47
He will be disappointed no doubt
Bobby,
What an ungrateful bunch they are!
Craig,
He must be tired or summit 😂 still can’t believe big Phil was stupid enough to say that!
Is 7 to 5 not quite generous odds for us to win on Thursday?
Not one for gambling usually but I might be tempted this week.
Great read Bobby.
Thinking about Celtic and their organic growth and the self inflicted death of the Huns for a minute. When was the last time the Huns won a Title that was without financial irregularities? 86/87??
Craig
i believe he woke up in a bad sweat
The joys of the holiday season — two weeks with the family / when will it end?
Football on Sunday — flexibility / fluidity / fast feet..
All much in evidence along with AE finding some confidence.
Showed the potential he has and the support he will need.
Fast feet — YH-j.
MJ vibe strong with that one.
So much for the talent — the good news is he knows he must mix it up.
Probably has learned as much in 6 months as MJ learned in 6 years.
Starter in Aug 2026 written all over him — looks better on the left.
PB @ 6 — might be worth a look.
He worked their press a lot more than current CMcG.
Consequently might have a long term role in that position/
RH had a quiet game but no team we play can afford to give him space.
Bluff / Double bluff if we can get AE up to anywhere near his potential.
AV is some player just a case I hope he got the Ladybird Book of LB play for Christmas.
His movement and engagement was a huge plus.
San Luis,
would the 87 team include players like Butcher, Woods and Stevens? So, England’s captain, right back and goalkeeper? Mmm! I think 78 would be a much better bet.
that’s if ANYTHING they’ve done is trustworthy!!
Sustainable organic growth — at least we know what the jokes were in the crackers in G74.
18 years a failure — little sign of that sustainable organic growth when he was the man in motion.
Sustainable organic growth at P/head — take a bow AP.
He moved the needle and got us moving forward.
The execs are now just trying to play catch up.
Sustainable organic growth — that would be the club and not the bank balance.
Govan FC / any version — they certainly moved the needle regarding physical conditioning.
70’s league success seemed to involve time at Gullane sands.
Excellent feel good story full of honest jungle fighting endeavour in stark contrast with the PEDs that were becoming part of Scottish sporting life.
My thoughts 86/87 generated a debt that the builders could not deal with.
Sustainable — not for any sane businessman.
SDM on the other hand …
Brum chat yesterday / the events of 50 years ago — can of worms.
Even 35 / 40 years later it cast a show over the city.
County Cov even Rugby were much more open to the club.
Down there for work — it was a struggle to get the CL games.
Single TV at the back that the locals were not interested in — even the Barca game.
County Cov on the other hand with the club on the Holyhead Road / Quigley’s in Egg Chasing land — good crowds / atmosphere / general interest in the games.
Wanton slaughter is never a good look.
Incredible that so many don’t learn the lesson.
Even worse when they revel in it.
We are in a bad place.
LIT,BAD
Marlborough was in control of Huns shares around 86 and with David Holmes probably used construction monies to pay for both the upgrade of Ibrox during late 70s and then the “Souness Revolution” in mid 80s. I’m willing to accept them bankrolling Souness and capitalising on English clubs ban from Europe to attract English players on salaries not far removed from what Ipswich or Watford were paying back then.
The League Cup they won that season wasn’t without the help of the SFA.
When SDM got involved a couple of years later, well that’s quite a different case of underhand winning.
Thursday’s game and an outcome that we want while still keeping big Phil in a job.
Another 0-4 would force their board to act, even if they didn’t want to.
They win – If they somehow manage to get a positive result against us, maybe they’d be able to kick the can a bit further down the road.
Another exciting score draw – See option 2.
As much as I’d like to win – And win handsomely – any result that means big Phil getting bagged definitely isn’t going to fill me with the joys.
It’s a real dilemma!
SL @ 1.35
Young team in the builders wanted to use their financial muscle to get the football team back up to the top table in the SPL.
Used the levers that were available to them to deliver change fast.
Not really a problem until the builders ran into issues with a development.
Chat back in the day had it in the US
Govan FC — £6mill in debt to the bank scared both the builders and the bank fartless.
Something had to be done and the ego formerly known as SDM took on the debt.
The club was free.
San Luis,
The wee man was just asking me what it was like finding out they were buying half the England team.
Told him I can remember being livid, quickly followed by being deeply suspicious
Turns out we were right to be suspicious!
LiT
Yeah, fast change with financial strings attached, which again got them into debt big time. However, I can also accept the urgent need for sporting success among the Hun big spenders meant they were willing to dig deep to achieve it. The £6m debt was probably a lot less but SDM would say any figure to look like a GIANT in the press, knowing no one would challenge him let alone look into it when he took over. I reckon £3-4m.
The rest was a 20 year pantomime that almost ruined Scottish football and certainly killed Rangers MK1
Leggy
December 31, 2024 11:55 am
https://photos.app.goo.gl/fiCUM9SKVcHsazQ47
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What a bunch of wascally scalawags! Really wish I could have been there. Was that BMCUWP practicing an allowable wee smirk?☺️ Is it because he managed for once to evade his sisterly chaperones?🤣
This living 3,000 miles away from Glesga gets pretty old sometimes.
HH
Iniquitous IV😊
Taylor being linked with a move to Dynamo Zagreb.
Anyone going past the airport any time soon?
BAD…Seasons greetings to you and your wee fella, I hope ’25 is good for you!
Re SDM’s tenure it was probably a few years before I was really suspicious, particularly the rebranding of the advertising inside the stadium when it was all about SDM’S companies. After that, the Diadora kit deal told me he was ripping every penny he could out of the club. The real revelations came much after but I’m with you, there were plenty of obvious signs that things weren’t as they were portrayed but were ignored by those who coulda/shoulda acted! They understand neither remorse nor humility. Factor in their inbuilt sense of supremacy and arrogance and my opinion will always be hell mend them no matter what comes thrir way!
Tavpen confirmed out for a few weeks.
Hi Bobby just a 39 degree day tomorrow
Tav out, centre-backs out, off-form team, under pressure manager…its wise to be wary of a wounded beast!!
This is bad news, would rather he played:
“Captain James Tavernier will miss the clash with Celtic amid a defensive injury crisis at Rangers.”
I would go for Bernardo over Engels on Thursday
McCaff,
Things are good mate.
Just finished booking Tenerife in January with him, so he is buzzing.
Hope the coming year is great for you and your family, my friend 👍
I’ve a feeling the Tic will bring many more happy days before we are opening presents again.
HailHail 🍀
BAD, McCaff et al,
Before RFC died, Murray launched a Share Issue. He underwrote it to the tune of £50m. They raised £51m in total. Only £1m from Hun fans (no laughing).
Of this £1m raised Murray charged £800k for an admin fee.
All of the above went thru the Murray Company books and the press dutifully remained silent.
HH
Tenerife in January sounds fantastic, mate!!
Cheers for the good wishes!
Hail Hail!!
600k for Barron
Bobby how much are you paying Emerald Hauck and his mates.
Hail Hail from Tenerife. Picked up at airport at 1.00 in blazing sun. Now sitting having a beer in a grey, cold windy day. If bigpacky goes into Frodsham he’ll have better weather than here 😁😁
Things are looking up. Just found out my local here is staying open until 2.00am
Last time we were here he said he was closing and going out on the razz
😁😁😁🍻🍻🍻