Celtic Diary Wednesday September 3: Pausing and Reflecting

For the first time in many years, we have both supporters, players and management at Celtic glad to see an international week arrive.

It takes the pressure off the management, the players can have a wee break after a frantic start to the campaign, and supporters can lighten up a wee bit as well.

It has been a wee bit negative on here, but it’s a Diary, and not a news round up. That means it will be more emotional-and irrational-than other sites, but at least it tries to be honest. And if you don’t agree, you are fully entitled to respond. Some comments do get lost, but theres no censorship as such, and we usually find them in cyberspace after a bit of searching.

Three years ago today the Diary found its way onto the web, and apart from surprising a lot of people with its longevity, ( me, mostly, ) it tries to speak from the heart. Sure, it can be fickle, but then again, that in itself is a true reflection of the football supporter. ( Me, mostly. )

Fickleness which will be proved when Stefan Scepovic bangs in his first few goals.

The Serb, who signed for Celtic at the last moment on Deadline Day, now maintains he always wanted to sign for Celtic, and not Getafe. He’ll change his mind again when the whether gets bad, but he’s here now, and as long as he does what he is paid to do, no-one will care that he wanted to go someone else instead.

Especially him. After traipsing around different European clubs on short term deals, he might now settle and find a club and support that appreciates him. He certainly knows where the goal is, and its down to him to make a name for himself.

He told the official website, or they told him to tell us :

 “I always have said that I was too young when I left my country and it was a mistake.

“It has taken me a long way to come back but I am here now and I have good experience from playing in many countries.

“It’s a great feeling for me. Celtic are a very big club and I hope we can do a lot this season. I know a lot about the club as it’s one with a big history and great fans and a lot of good players have played here.” 

Actually, that first line is very interesting. He came to our attention at Gijon, which is the team he’s been most settled at. Going abroad too young probably was a mistake, but he seems to have got over it. Perhaps we have found our goalscorer…

He was asked how he would describe his style, and his reply was straight to the point;

“When they asked me in Spain, I said the same thing: it’s on the pitch where you need to speak and it will be the same here,” said the hitman. 

 Sounds good to me. And he looks happy enough.

He went on to give his version of the on-off transfer, which are irrelevant now, but worth noting;

‘My first choice was always Celtic, I never said I didn’t want to come here. I don’t know why people say things like that. When I spoke with my family and friends, I always said my choice was to come here. Yes, there were some problems in the deal but the most important thing is that I am here now.

‘I know (some fans might be wary). But

they can search the internet and they will never find any quotes from me where I said I didn’t want to come to Celtic. Never — because I didn’t say it.

‘I know Celtic is a big club with a lot of history and great fans. I want to prove I can play at a big club like Celtic.

‘I’ll work hard and do everything to prove I can play here and bring something different. 

 Fair enough.

‘Monday was a tough day, but that’s football,’ he added. ‘I was in my house watching TV and I was really a little bit nervous because of the situation. But at the same time I was calm. I had a choice before I chose Celtic and I was happy when I knew I would be a Celtic player.

‘What made me nervous? It’s normal. I was nervous because maybe there were some problems. But I don’t want to look at what happened before. I just look to the future.’

Er, alright. we believe you. didn’t you say you’d do your talking on the pitch ?

 He replaces Teemu Pukki and Amido Balde, neither of whom made the grade at Celtic. Largely because they weren’t good enough in the end. However, there was a surprise when neither of them missed their flights to their new destinations, although Pukki hesitated before going up the steps, and Balde fell over them.

 They never really got a chance, but thats Celtic. It’s a results business, and they didn’t give us a result.

 John Guidetti was also supposed to arrive, and typically the press reckon that the u-turn in the Scepovic deal meant he was suddenly surplus to requirements, and Lawwell hid in the toilet until after midnight, before apologising for having to use the paperwork for another purpose.

   But Guidettti doesn’t think that is the case…

 “ It was total chaos ”  said the Swede.  ” I don’t think I ate all day,” 

 He wasn’t referring to the price of the food inside Celtic Park, or to the quality.

“It was just wait, wait, wait. Hundreds of fans stood outside the stadium and waited in the middle of the night,” 

And not one of them offered to nip to the chippy for him.

Anyway, it all fell through at the last minute, the SFA couldn’t find any paper for the fax machine, then it emerged that someone had left the door open to the carrier pigeons cage, and no-one had any credit on their phones.

All of this frenzied activity took place in the SFA head office under a picture of former head, the late Jim Farry, (late Jim Farry here refers to the fact he has passed away, and not his paperwork procesing ability. ) and those present swear they saw a little smile form on his face.

Anyway, the SFA have appealed to FIFA, and all parties are hopeful the deals  not dead yet.

 ” I hope that it sorts itself out with Celtic, otherwise I’ll have to stay at City and that’s not the worst thing that could happen,” Guidetti said. “Unfortunately, the papers weren’t finished in time and now it’s up to FIFA to decide.” 

 Apart from being a prolific striker at Feyenoord, Guidetti is Swedish, and we seem to do okay with Swedish guys who used to pay for Feyenoord. If Celtic are to be referred to as Southamptons feeder club, then Manchester City could well be ours. Guidetti would join Samaras, Bitton and Denayaar as not being glamourous enough for them, but more than capable of performing at a high level.

 There is a question over his eye to ball co-ordination, though.

 Perhaps a wee bell or something inside it to help him out ?

Kris Commons is probably a little relieved he isn’t going anywhere. Although he does have one or two concerns, which are not dissimilar to those of the support;

“My agent has been in this week, obviously just for brief discussions, not just about the length of the contract I’m going to sign but what’s going to be happening in the future for Celtic and where the board sees us in two or three years.

“Because, when you have had such a successful time at Celtic, you want to keep doing that. You don’t want to take backward steps.

“I’m 31 at the weekend so I want to be playing the best years of my career at the top level.

“I’m hoping with the new manager and new faces coming in that we can achieve the same things that we did in the first few years.

“There were things said in the meeting that were positive.” 

“When you get new management and coaching staff, then obviously they have different ideas and different mentality going into different games.

“The new manager is obviously on a bit of a learning curve about what his best team is and the best formation is. It’s just one of those things that has changed at the minute.”

 “I’ve got a great relationship with the players, staff and fans and I just want to keep performing for Celtic as long as possible.

“I have played my best football for Celtic and I love playing for them.” 

 Surely something can be sorted that keeps everyone happy, and Commons can get back to enjoying his football. Which is when he is at his most productive.

 One move that we didn’t notice on deadline day saw Red Bull midfielder Sadio Mine join southampton in a £12m deal. He had scored 45 goals for the Austrian side in just 86 games. One less for us to worry about.

Virgil van Dijk is reportedly furious that he didn’t get his move, but having been happy to sign a four year deallast year, the least he could do is hang around for half of it.

 He’ll get his move one day, but he’s not the player he thinks he is. He still has a way to go to be that.

 As we have said, the diary was three years old today, but checking the archives it appears I’m out by a couple of days. It started on September 1 2011.

 The transfer window had just closed, then as now, and this is how it went….

Ins: Adam Matthews (Cardiff, free), Kelvin Wilson (Nottingham Forest, free), Victor Wanyama (Germinal Beerschot, £900,000), Fraser Forster (Newcastle, loan), Mohamed Bangura (AIK, undisclosed), Badr El-Kaddouri (Dynamo Kiev, loan).

Not bad.

Outs: Paul McGowan (St Mirren, free), Freddie Ljungberg (released), Ryan Conroy (Dundee, free), Graham Carey (St Mirren, free), Niall McGinn (Brentford, loan), Ben Hutchinson (Kilmarnock, free) Andreas Hinkel (released) Daryl Murphy (Ipswich, loan), Richie Towell (Hibernian, loan), Shaun Maloney (Wigan, undisclosed), Jos Hooiveld (Southampton ) 

Kind of surprising Southampton ever came back north of the border after acquiring Hooiveld.

The picture yesterday referred to the Alfredo di Stefano testimonial, which took place shortly after Celtic had won the European Cup in 1967. Real Madrid, who thought they had some sort of divine right to win that trophy set about to prove they were the moral champions, if not the actual ones.

Jimmy Johnstone soon put them right. It was arguably the hoops best performance of that season.

Who’s the goalscorer here ?