There may be doubts about how Celtic recruit their strikers, which appears to be somewhere between playing pin the tail on the donkey  and asking a a guy down the pub, but when it comes to keepers the club usually gets it right.

So , despite not having heard of him, we can be fairly sure that Logan Bailly, a former Belgian international, will be up to the job.

He joins from OH Leuven , where he has just helped his side get promoted to the top division, and as he is under contract, there will be a fee involved. Probably around £250,000, or what they call a “nominal fee”, as his contract is up in 2016.

Wikipedia gives us a fairly loose rundown on the guy;

He arrived in Borussia Mönchengladbach in 2009 from Genk, where he had played since 2002. For the duration of the 2003–04 season, Bailly was on loan at Beringen-Heusden-Zolder, along with ten other Genk players.^[1]

Bailly replaced Jan Moons as Genk’s first-choice goalkeeper at the beginning of the 2006–07 season; he played 90 minutes in every single Belgian League match for the club that season. He kept 14 clean sheets and received no bookings.^[2] His good performance contributed to Genk’s surprising second-place finish. He was transferred to Borussia Mönchengladbach during the winter of season 2008–09 and immediately adapted to the Bundesliga. He was elected best player of gameday 20 in the league.^[3]

During the 2011–12 season he was initially loaned out to Swiss side Neuchâtel Xamax, for whom he never played a single match. In the second part of the season, he was loaned back to Genk. After the season he returned to Mönchengladbach where his contract was not renewed, allowing him to sign as a free agent player for OH Leuven. At OHL, he was rejoined with coach Ronny Van Geneugden, who was his coach during his period as a youth player at Genk. After a series of good performances, Bailly was rewarded on 2 December with a one year extension, giving him a contract until the end of the 2013–14 season.^[4]   

He should be alright. Look at the size of his hands;

The club have had to order special gloves.

He gets loaned out a lot, seemingly doing well and then falling apart. Notably, he went to second division Levuene to work again with the coach he started out with, which suggests he didn’t settle elsewhere. Or he felt he needed help to kickstart his career.

It could be that he will benefit from the new, modern scientific methods employed at Celtic Park.

Training has changed over the years, you know.

One point worth making, is that he has played for Belguim at every level from under 16 through to the senior team, which means there is ability there, but perhaps he needs to be managed properly.

Over to Stevie Woods, who has worked wonders with keepers at Celtic.

Working wonders is something that Ronny, Johnny and John will have to do with Nadir Ciftci, who , and fair enough to him, is sitting waiting by the phone to get that call which says he can go to Celtic. At least he seems to want to play in the hoops, and it now appears that the club have matched the £1.5m price tag which allows feeder club Dundee United to re invest it in next summers Celtic targets.

 Opinion is divided on the player.

Some think that his personality and style will add something to the team, as we don’t have anyone we can count on to bite the opposition, to punch them, or to kick them. Others argue that we have had “problem players ” in before and they haven’t done too badly.

After all, there might well be a  Stairway to Heaven, but there’s also a Highway to Hell, so you know where the Big Man expects to see congestion….

One thing to ponder is that at least one other player, who came with a reputation of being a pain in the arse, and perhaps a risk where discipline and standards were involved, didn’t turn out too badly;

Because , one day they do it in Celtic’s colours and it becomes an iconic image…

So, there are arguments on both sides, and I’m not convinced, but as you can see , it won’t take much to convince me.

Although I think I have spotted which game one of our scouts was at…

The doo lallies don’t always work out.

But when they do….

Anyway, it’s going to happen, and that’s that. And I can’t wait for the headlines praising Celtic for keeping money in the Scotttish game.

A statement on Dundee United’s website said;

“Dundee United today confirmed that an undisclosed fee had been agreed with those robbing bastards Celtic for Nadir Ciftci and permission has been granted for the Glasgow club to speak to the player. I fucking hate them. I’ll be in the bar if anyone wants me ” 

It appears the editor copied the words down as they were spoken by the chairman, and forgot to cut a couple out.

Ciftci’s impending suspension will affect the fee. Depending on what happens.

Speaking of those who may be judged to have, er, unsettling or disruptive personality issues, Aiden McGeady is also sitting by the phone waiting for the call to come to Celtic.

 His issue, as mentioned by podcast guest Mince, from Celtic Minded, is that he may be the billy big time who feels he is a level above the rest, despite not actually having achieved anything of note in his career so far, except for a couple of decent twists and the odd cross that didn’t require climbing irons to get to it.

 However, a more mature and experienced McGeady, should such a thing exist, playing in a number ten role to allow Stefan Johansen , the living embodiment of the Duracell bunny, a wee bit of rest, might well be a gamble worth taking.

 I’m a fan of McGeady, believe it or not, and he may well benefit from sound coaching from Ronny, and let’s face it, when John Collins is in the room, there won’t be space for Aiden’s ego as well.

 What no-one has spotted is that if we get McGeady, we will have to get Darren O’Dea back as well, because other wise Aiden will have to stay home every night as he will have no-one to stop him from getting his head kicked in.

Boyata, ( for the badly spelt Denaayer )  Bailly, ( for Zaluska )  Ciftci, ( for Guidetti ) Janko ( for Matthews ),,,,,

Deila isn’t hanging  about, is he ?

He said he would trim the squad, but he obviously has no intention of weakening it.

Adam Matthews didn’t hang about for long after Saidy Janko signed. He has explained why;

“The international thing was a major part of me moving.

“The league in Scotland isn’t great and I think the Welsh manager saw that and hopefully this move will help me improve my chances of getting into the Welsh team because they are doing really well at the minute. But I just needed a new challenge.

“I have been at Celtic for four years and enjoyed every minute of it but I spoke to my agent and it seemed to be a good move for me at this stage. I’m happy to move forward and playing in the English Premier League was a big factor in my decision – Sunderland are a massive club, there is no doubt about it.

“It was a hard decision, I had grown close to a lot of the boys at Celtic but I just felt I needed something new. I think I have made the right decision. Celtic are a great club and I wish them all the best for the future.”

I don’t think even he believes that….

Right, it’s experiment with technology  time . A Diary reader, outside Ibrox spotted a fan heading to renew his season book, and rather unkindly shouted across to him that his club was, in fact,  “deed ” Oddly enough, the supporter seemed to have a St. Paul on the road to Damascus moment;

If that works, it means I can add other interesting and amusing videos to the Diary, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up.

I haven’t.

Meanwhile, UEFA are taking action over an incident during Aberdeen’s European tie last week;

UEFA open case against Aberdeen’s Euro opponents

over laser attack

Wow. They take their football seriously in Macedonia, and you can see why it might have broken  the Don’s goalkeeper’s concentration.

John McCluskey was the player in the photograph yesterday, a member of the McCluskey dynasty that was so prevalant in the Celtic squads of the seventies and eighties.

 From the Celtic Wiki…

The younger brother of striker George, John McCluskey was a schoolboy sensation who was expected to have a massive future in the game. He emulated George when he scored for Scottish schoolboys at Wembley on June 7th 1975. Before Paul McStay he was Celtic’s youngest ever S form signing. 

A product of Celtic Boys Club John was an intelligent forward who signed ‘S’ forms with Celtic in 1973 when he was just 13-years-old.

However despite all his early promise John was to make just one competitive appearance for the Hoops as his young career was destroyed by thrombosis which meant a knock to his leg could prove fatal. 

His one game came as a sub in Luxembourg on September 28th 1977 as Celtic defeated Jeunesse Esch 6-0 in the European Cup.

It was a sad end to his career, as he was to put it:

“I’ve been given tablets to thin the clot and no doubt I’ll do all right but I know I’ll never play football again”. 

A difficult comment for any aspiring player to have to make and accept. 

Today, it’s another who and where, courtesy of St. Anthony on twitter.

So, who is scoring the goal, and where is he scoring it.

Simple concept, really.