Celtic Diary Wednesday March 2: Try Something Else Tonight!

Has anyone else noticed that the Evening Times lists todays date as Wednesday 2 March March March ?

Celtic face Dundee tonight, and Dens manager Paul Hartley, a former title winning Celt, has been pondering how to approach the game, may field a weakened side as he looks forward to his clubs cup quarter final and first ever meeting with Second Rangers;

“It’s an important game and we’re on a good run. So we’re caught in between things a bit.

“But we have to look at the squad as a whole and try and pick the best team for Wednesday night and the best team for Saturday.

“Since we beat Dumbarton it’s been a case of – how do we approach our team selection and systems?

“It’s sort of kept me up every night. What do I do? What’s best for the team and the players?

“It’s definitely a test for myself and how I manage the squad.” 

There’s no return to paradise for Darren O’Dea, for whom dundee is the latest stop on his football world tour, and Thomas Konrad will also be missing.

Celtic will be looking for a win to bring that fifth consecutive title closer, and no doubt we’ll see the urgency transferred to the players by the management team.

Celtic have James Forrest back in the squad, but apart from that its the usual suspects.

Lets try something different. 4-4-1-1

Fasan , Janko, Ambrose, Sviatchenko, Izaguirre: Mackay-Steven, Allan , Christie, Roberts: Forrest: Griffiths.

Forrest in the Messi role behind Griffiths, Roberts and Mackay Steven on the flanks, with Christie and Allan doing the passing.

7-0 it is then.

In a sense, the middle part of the run to ten is the most boring. The pressure is there to keep the momentum going, but it all gets a little samey, and perhaps predictable without the sense that history is being made and the sense of possible failure is overriding the end result.

After all, most of the players here now, whilst undoubtedly playing their part in the run, won’t be around to celebrate the restoration of the natural order of things when the tenth title is finally secured.

Its difficult to lift performances a gear when you know that you are expected to win, and it wouldn’t be completely unfair to consider that Ronny Deila is more afraid of being the man who blew a chance of ten in a row than the man who achieved it.

Yet there is more to the level of consistency required than simply picking eleven players from the biggest squad in the country to do a job week after week, game after game.

If we can get bored watching it, there’s every chance the players can get bored playing it, which is why European football after christmas is much more important than competing in the champions League.

Put simply, we all need something to look forward to, something to lift the matches from the normal humdrum of the league.

Celtic v Dundee on a wet wednesday doesn’t sound like box office, and so thats where the manager and the players come in.

Turn it into box office. Pick a side who want to go out and entertain, a side who will not be afraid to try to enthrall the crowd, and make it enjoyable for them, and in turn , the crowd will respnd which will lift the players and make it a much more enjoyable experience all round.

Then everyone might even look forward to the next game….

Yesterday was St. Atement Day, with both the club and the Affilaition of Supporters clubs putting out their opinions on a couple of subjects, and it was most welcome.

The club commented on the Offensive Behaviour Act;

WE note the comments made today by a number of sources calling for the repeal of the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Act 2012.

We have consistently opposed this legislation from the outset as it has been used to create a general presumption that different laws should apply to football supporters as distinct from society as a whole.

We reiterate our position that the Act should be repealed. 

We encourage and promote positive behaviour within football at all times and welcome any attempt to do likewise. 

However, this Act is unworkable, and once again we call for it to be repealed in the interests of all football supporters and football clubs. 

Short, sensible and to the point.

If I have one tiny criticism it’s that the statement was made by the “club ” , and not by an individual at the club, such as Peter Lawwell , which means that there is no follow up publicity, such as an interview to maybe attract even more attention to the law, which in turn would hasten its removal from the staute books.

But, as they say, it’s better than a poke in the eye with a stick.

The Association statement concerns the upcoming trip to Kilmarnock , who regrettably, despite a few valiant attempts to change this, are still in the Premier league;

In October 2015, Kilmarnock FC amended their tickets prices to £20 per adult for all Scottish Premier games this season apart from games against Celtic where the price for any adult supporter wishing to attend would be £26.

 Kilmarnock, after listening to concerns of their own support that the cost of football was too high and that £20 was a fair and reasonable price, have decided to punish that same support just because Celtic are the opposition.

 Why should all supporters who wish to attend this fixture, which has been moved to a 12:30pm kick off for TV, be asked to pay £6 more for this game than for any other game at the same venue in the same competition?

 No supporter should be asked to pay more than another to watch the same product, in the same seats and using the same facilities.

 The latest UEFA Licensing Report states that Scottish Football Fans pay the 5th highest ticket prices in Europe to watch a league ranked 24th. No supporter should be paying £26 to watch a game in Scotland. Talk to any supporter or look at the results of the many surveys on what is wrong with the Scottish game and ticket pricing is the main issue.

 This situation highlights a broken and outdated ticket policy, which sees all supporters punished if a club has a larger travelling support or the game is categorised differently.  Situations like this one shows the problems that arise when clubs don’t discuss pricing with supporters or each other.

 Enough is enough. Despite empty seats in nearly every ground in Scotland clubs continue to ignore supporters on the ticket pricing issue.

 This is why we will be protesting at this game. We are asking supporters from both teams to join us behind the Moffat Stand from 12pm and not to enter the stadium until 5 minutes after the game has kicked off.  The majority of our members have taken the ultimate decision to boycott the game but some will be attending the protest.

We want Scottish clubs to work towards 

Lower ticket prices – Twenty’s Plenty for all!  

Some time ago, the site was asked for it’s opinions on the Twenty’s Plenty idea by supporters liason officer John Paul Taylor. This is based around the English fans campaign that no away fan should pay more than twenty quid to watch the game.

That’s not going to happen in England, but its certainly worth pursuing.

In Scotland, the clubs depend more on admission money, and it’s perhaps no coincidence that the club with the biggest hike between fans of other clubs and fans of Celtic is actually the one allegedly closest to following Rangers out of business.

However, the point still stands.

Why not open up more of their ground, charge less and try to make money that way ?

The idea is to get people going to games, not boycotting them, and Kilmarnocks remarkably short sighted policy looks set to bite them in the arse, and if it does it will need a tetanus injection. i wouldn’t bite anything in that part of the world, especially the much hyped Killie pie. Which I’m sure would be better described by replacing the second ” i” with a “Y” and making it into two words.

As you can gather, Rugby Park is not my favourite place, and the club isn’t either.

Five of us travelled up a while back, having ordered and paid for tickets on the Kilmarnock website, for the away end. At least thats what our CSC online ticket buyer told us, and when we arrived, we found no such tickets existed, and we had to buy five more .

So, on that basis alone I’m right behind any boycott, purely because of who and where the boycott will take place.

However, in the interests of fairness, the whole campaign should be expanded, but only to Scottish cup games, until the SFA are forced out.

Over on Instagram , Celtic midfielders Nir Biton and Stefan Johansen have found an application which does what it says on the tin.

FaceSwap. Which mixes the fetures of two people around a bit

And here is what happened when they used it…

I find that quite disturbing. In all sorts of ways.

Especially as this season you could have taken both players skills and attributes, mixed them together, and still failed to come up with a decent holding midfielder.

Elsewhere, two of Scottish footballs movers and shakers are off to Geneva next week, where a crisis meeting is taking place to formulate a plan to oppose the changes to the Champions League, where the continents big clubs want to leave the wee clubs out on the cold…

Unfortuantely, both have promised to return, but while they are over there they intend to do their bit for the wee clubs in the wee countries.

Unless they can come up with a better idea where the big clubs in the wee countries can break away from the wee clubs in the wee countries…

A Daily Record “source ” said;

“There’s a feeling that Scotland hasn’t woken up. Doncaster made it clear that this trip could have a huge significance for Scottish football.

“But Lawwell then took over in his usual forceful manner to hammer home that it’s not simply Celtic’s problem – it’s a problem for every top flight club.

“He made it clear that everyone needs to understand how big this could be and how much damage it could cause if access to the Champions League is not available to Scotland’s champions.

“Celtic’s failure to make the last two Champions League campaigns has cost these clubs around £250,000 in bonuses. But if they are denied access to the Champions League then, as a knock-on effect, they will take a Europa League spot away from the likes of an Aberdeen or Hearts.”

Thats made me feel better, Neil Doncaster out there batting for Scottish football. 

Caption competition-go on then…

Finally, a big happy birthday to Billy McNeill, 76 today. all the bets, big man.