Celtic crashed out of Europe at the hands of Sion last night, along with Rankers and Hearts. It highlights the huge disparity in Scottish football between even lowly footballing countries like Switzerland. Never mind Celtic, where does Scottish Football go from here? I think its too late to go back to “grass roots” level, and think that the caliber or desire of players (especially for Celtic) is seriously in doubt?

Celtic were only a few years ago challenging for European Trophies, whereas nowadays we are struggling against the likes of St Johnstone, AT HOME! Neil Lennon must surely be wondering now why he was given the job, as I fear any decent manager with experience would not want to work with the players that we have. SPL football is now of a standard where even league 1 or 2 teams in England would give us a tough game. Is money the answer to the problem? I don’t believe that if you brought in a few quality players it would give the rest of the squad the desire and hunger to get Celtic over the line in games. What do you think the SPL or Celtic can do to get themselves out of this?

Celtic are currently fighting to prevent another dip in form, which so dearly cost of the league last season.  Its almost the Liverpool effect where we seem to think we will breeze past the smaller teams and end up slipping up and giving points away. However should this be the real point of focus?  With the lack of quality signings this season and whats seems to be for the foreseeable future, should the focus be solely on Europe?

We urgently need to be able to bring in talent to help us gain strength and be able to compete, at least with the Championship clubs, if not the Premier League.  By progressing through European competitions it highlights our club, our fans and the team to all sorts of players across the globe, not just in Europe.  It is these ambitious players who want to succeed in European comps which will raise the standard in the club, which will surely lead to better SPL results?

Currently the players we are bringing through the ranks are plainly not good enough to cut it, and the level of signings currently being made leaves a lot to be desired.  The club seems to be nosediving in quality terms at the moment, the atmosphere in Parkhead is lacking its sparkle, the players are afraid of the weight of expectation, and the manager seems to be admitting we are no longer a force to be reckoned with.  However we do have minimal debt!  I think some people’s piggy banks need to be raided..and soon

‘Dermot Desmond, the majority shareholder at Celtic Park and Denis O’Brien who has a 2.82% share of the club. In Four Four Two’s Top 100 Rich List of 2009/10, O’Brien sat in 6th position ahead of the likes of Bernie Ecclestone, the Glazers and Alisher Usmanov. With the likes of Stan Kroenke, Joe Lewis, Roman Abramovich, Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan and Lakshmi Mittal ahead of him. Desmond sat 12th on the list.’

“The fans wanted us to play direct football in front of their goal. That’s when the confidence of some of us went down because the crowd demanded more from us and we just couldn’t handle it.” – Victor Wanyama, If he can’t handle the demand to beat St. Johnstone then why is he here? He said he new all about the club, if true he should know that losing 1-0 to St. Johnstone is well BLOODY UNACCEPTABLE

Sean Carr

Where is the fecking striker??? While the European game last Thursday was poor, the game on Sunday was embarrassing – considering the Celtic squad is probably the biggest in the SPL, we don’t have 2 fully fit strikers that can play consistently together every week.  We don’t have a big target man to get stuck in away from home and fight for our forwards and our back line looked as well constructed and as solid as Shane McGowan’s teeth.  Did we not know over a year ago the positions that needed to be strengthened?

So who have we brought in?

Foster – GK – Loan – Big lurch has been on the top of Lennon’s GK List since his record breaking season last year with us.  He seems to have been told at some point that the ball shagged his ma, because all he seems to want to do with it is punch the bejaysus out of it.

K.Wilson – CB – Free – Kelvin has played 3 games for us since escaping from the ‘fritzl suite’ underneath Nottingham Forests training ground.  Since then he has managed to get injured and we are back to square one regarding centre of defence.

Matthews – RB – Free (with minimal compensation to Cardiff) – Currently inhabits the No 2 shirt (previously ‘used’ by Andreas  Hinkel… which pretty much speaks for itself).

Wanyama – D. Mid - £900,000 – The big Kenyan Provo has looked quite solid, but still is a new player trying to find his feet in a new club.

So for under £1million we have brought in a flappy keeper, a crook centre back, a young prospect at right back and an ok defensive midfielder. As I’m predicting the Green Brigades next big hit for this season will be – Just not good enough!

I understand that ‘in the current climate’ we have to be careful with money, and yes we have reduced our debt and are running just into profit – but guess what – I SUPPORT A FOOTBALL TEAM, NOT A MODEL OF FISCAL PRUDENCE!!!! We all laugh about the huns financial situation – but this is the same huns that are going for 4 in a row, the same huns that spent 4 million on a striker last season that basically won them the league, and the same huns who have strengthened last year’s team despite being dumped out of the Champions League.

Get your finger out Desmond and give Lenny the money he needs to bring in another CB, and decent proven Sticker – and I’m not talking a loan move for an aging forward, I’m talking about someone who knows what a football is and where it should be – the opposition goal!

Rant over!!!
Tom Gallahue

So its been a little while since the country seemed to go mental, and after hearing all the news outlets churning out the same stories over and over again, I thought I would throw in my two cents.  so here goes…

The Origin of the riots was a peaceful protest by family, friends and the community in Tottenham, at the death of Mark Duggan.  Police shot dead Mr Duggan as they suspected he had fired at them and retaliated.  There have been unsubstantiated rumours about Mr Duggan’s criminal links, and the fact he had access to a firearm.  Reports have also been made that Mr Duggan may not have fired at all, however there is still an ongoing inquiry into the precise turn of events that led to his death.  As a result of the discord in the community, there was animosity towards the police which resulted in a stand off with the police, and the destruction of property and fires being lit.  The police’s response was to deploy riot squads which were then ordered to retreat.  This was the key to the escalation of violence and destruction.

Escalation of the destruction then followed quickly as other gangs of youths realised that the police were not going to intervene.  This culminated in wholesale looting, robbery, assault and large scale public disorder.

The attempts to use these events to portray a political argument were pathetic and only go to further entrench the visible gap between the political powers and the deprived communities around the country.  In my opinion the person to come out of this whole debacle is the youth worker Shaun Bailey who obviously has common sense, and a clear idea about why the yobs ran amok. This interview can be seen below.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/9559926.stm

As far as the police goes, they are in a very difficult position, damned if they do, and damned if they don’t.  However this does not go to excuse them for not getting stuck in to protect the people, and their property.  They should however be given leeway to deal with the looters however they see fit, preferably very heavy handed, with large blunt instruments.

The news outlets are very much to blame in this regard as any police seeing to use any force at all is treated as some kind of beast, which are then turned upon.  If people think they can get away with something, they will try it on.  Only a serious deterrent and actual retaliation for such actions will prevent opportunism, and would have kept a lid on things if the police acted in such a manner.  Seeing the calls now for police and the courts to be lenient are in my view ridiculous and go a long way to show why people these days are so brazen, when any crime no matter how outrageous will have some corners believing that the perpetrators are “victim” of poverty, circumstance, no parental guidance….rubbish.  If you can have the brains (or lack of them) to commit a crime then you are wholly responsible for your actions, and no amount of pleading or excuses should be used as some sort of defence.

Lets hope the police and the courts will actually enforce the sentences imposed and prove to the rest of the yobs around the country that this behaviour will not be tolerated.

Rant Over

Come to Captain Morgan’s and see the fantastic Dublin Super Cup. Come and see the bhoys take on the mighty Inter Milan, Man City and The Airtricity XI.  The action kicks off on SATURDAY 30TH JULY 2001. Match details are below

2:00 pm Kick-off: Airtricity XI vs Manchester City

4.30 pm Kick-off: Inter Milan vs Celtic

SUNDAY 31ST JULY 2011

2.00 pm Kick-off: Airtricity XI vs Celtic

4.30 pm Kick-off: Inter Milan vs Manchester City

See you there

Does there now need to be anti terrorist police attending games? What can Celtic FC do to protect Lennon from this kind of attack, and does there need to be a wholesale rethink about security or maybe even the links between the Old Firm and religious sentiment.