Celtic Banter Archive May 30 2018

30 May 2018 17:43:13
I think McGinn would be a good player for us, i really do. I haven't said the opposite, ever. I also watch every scottish game (even sevco) so no, i don't just watch Celtic even though they are the team for me. I also do watch the Euros + the WC. And scotland games, let's not mention last night. I just haven't seen McGinn really stand out in the league.

I didn't see him stand out in the 5-5 draw with Sevco either. Now that's just my opinion, which others ARE allowed to disagree with. I also did not write off Scott Brown in the Ronny years, or Armstrong etc. I will not write off a player until they have played a considerable ammount of games for us. So it is quite disrespectful to say that the people who don't share the same enthusiasm about McGinn as certain others do, obviously don't know football, etc etc.

I am 22, have followed Celtic since the age of 4, and do follow scottish football. People are allowed their opinion, but to shoot someone down and get all pi$$y when someone offers a different opinion is not right. we all love Celtic, we all follow Celtic, we all want the best for Celtic. I'll be the first to hold my hands up if we sign McGinn and he turns out to be the first name on the 11. But i will welcome McGinn into the club if/ when he joins, and will be wishing him the best of luck.

Note - I am not throwing the dummie out, just wanted to comment on the matter, and let people know that i do watch scottish football, and celtic, hibs etc.

30 May 2018 19:17:39
That's a great post Brendan, but I believe John Mcginn has the talent and heart to play for us for the next ten years.

30 May 2018 20:03:10
Good for you Brendan.

31 May 2018 10:34:38
I'm 50/ 50 on the bhoy . some games he looks the part others he looks like a headless chicken (this is only from few live games and highlights mind you ) is he best as a left sided mid. box to box or defensive mid? As when seeing him he seems to flit between all. which does make him versatile. i won't be unhappy if he signed or unhappy if he didn't.

31 May 2018 11:13:16
I am very similar to you DRP. I made a point of keeping an eye on him since we've been linked and all though he stood out against us he did disappear against a lot of other teams. Most notable Hearts and rangers. I was more impressed by mcgeogh to be honest.
My father always tells me to judge a player in Scotland on how they play against the best team so in that respect I am 50/ 50 on him.
If he signs then he will get the same chance and support everyone else gets from me.

31 May 2018 11:49:03
That's a fair comment Kev. I don't think anyone really knows how he will do until he is here and training/ playing. Like every other signing a gamble. My hope is he comes in and does a great job and i expect him to do that going by the games i have seen him play. What a joy it would be to see so many Tims wearing the shirt when we seal 10.

31 May 2018 15:56:30
I think we should sign him but the thing is, would he be happy coming here and not playing regularly for maybe 2 years?
Brown will start whenever he is fit, so will Ntcham and with the wizard signing his new contract then that's him a starter whenever he is fit.
I do think the boy would be a great addition but he won't get a regular place until Brown retires or one of the others are sold.

{Ed007's Note - So if Rogic hadn't signed you'd be happy to sign McGinn to play in the No. 10 ACM role that Rogic plays in?}

31 May 2018 23:44:38
I never said that ED,
I said would he be happy sitting about for a few years. Brown and Ntcham have they spots tied down and now so does Rogic. If Rogic had left If we didn't buy a new No:10 we might have moved Ntcham forward into the No:10 role which he played when he was at Genoa for 2 years and played McGinn beside Brown.

02 Jun 2018 11:33:07
mcgeough? give yourself peace kev.

30 May 2018 13:20:57
Full list of teams we can face in UCL qualifying (we'll need to beat 4 of these) .
Shkendija, Dudelange, Spartak Trnava, Valletta, Vikingur Gota, Crusaders, Olimpija Ljubljana, Alashkert, Sutjeska Niksic, Suduva Marijampole, Spartaks Jurmala, Cork City, Valur, Flora Tallinn, Torpedo Kutaisi, Midtjylland, CFR Cluj, Red Star Belgrade, Hapoel Be-er Sheva, Rosenborg, HJK Helsinki, The New Saints, Videoton, Kukesi, Zrinjski Mostar, AEK Athens, BATE Borisov, Dinamo Zagreb, Qarabag, Sheriff Tiraspol, Malmo, Young Boys, Astana, Legia Warsaw, APOEL

Realistically 1 from the bottom 4/ 5 in the play off round, 1 from the 8 or so before that in the 3rd qualifier, and two from the top half in the earlier rounds.

Very difficult, but not impossible.

30 May 2018 13:47:48
Feeling we will get Legia Warsaw at some stage.

30 May 2018 14:06:21
only a matter of time before we run into them again.

For me, as long as we stick to western europe we should be ok - Crusaders/ Cork for the first couple of rounds would be ideal, then maybe helsinki/ malmo something like that.

30 May 2018 15:56:55
Guys most of us Celtic fans if not exactly worried about us making the group stages again, are not counting our chickens as we could meet a team well into their season, or Celtic could have a bad day or be fatigued, especially if we get Astana again on the other side of the universe.
Now compare our cautious attitude to a sevconian fan, who almost to a man, have got the new club not only in the group stages of the Europa League but quarter final at worst.
Despite them falling flat last year, having an inexperienced manager and probably most of last season's failures.
Their arrogance and self entitlement knows no bounds.

30 May 2018 16:29:21
It's getting to be a great achievement to qualify for the group stage considering the timing of the qualifiers in relation to our season and the number of games we have to play - even as champions.
CL nights are a unique experience at Celtic Park, even though we have suffered some heavy defeats recently; however, the reality of being a Celtic supporter as opposed to the delusional dumplings in denial is we have used the CL cash to ensure financial security, attract and keep the best players in the country and employ an experienced, quality manager, who lives and breaths our club and it's successes.

30 May 2018 16:37:08
I'm completely on the side of Legia for that last time. They hammered us fair and square.

Our board should have done the decent thing and asked UEFA to keep Legia in.

Uefa would have still kicked them regardless, but I think it made our club look small time and it was zombie patter.

{Ed007's Note - So you think that Celtic should have accepted a fine and possible five-year ban from UEFA competition? What Legia Warsaw done wrong had absolutely nothing to do with Celtic, Celtic didn't break any rules which wouldn't have been the case if we had been stupid enough to do what you wanted.
So who should have taken Legia Warsaw's place?}

30 May 2018 16:52:11
Well we better get into the champions league since it’s been confirmed if we don’t that we will fold like a pack of cards😱.

30 May 2018 17:54:06
No, I didn't say break the rules. I didn't say to forfeit the competition.

I said we should have made a statement basically saying we got beat fair and square and it's an unfortunate mistake by Legia.

As I said either way we were going to be put in place of Legia, but we should have shown them some support as their error was tiny and had no impact on the result at all.

Instead the way we handled ourselves was disrespectful.

Like when Legia appealed, Celtic said they were "disappointed" - what do they expect Legia to do? roll over and accept getting kicked out after absolutely humiliating us?

{Ed007's Note - Yes. They broke the rules by fielding an ineligible player and they should have accepted their punishment. Celtic done nothing wrong and weren't disrespectful - whatever that's meant to mean - to anyone.}

30 May 2018 18:29:07
Young Boys are a decent side, be good to avoid them .

30 May 2018 18:50:30
Ed007 . It is surely true Celtic is a club for all, even those who want the club to exit Champions League illegally.

{Ed007's Note - You can't just pick and choose what games you want to play, without there being serious repercussions.}

30 May 2018 19:17:08
They pumped us silly lol and we didn't deserve to go through as was seen against Maribor.

they brought that guy on as a sub in the last 2 minutes and we were already 6-1 down on agg.

If we won 6-1 and fielded a sub in last 2 mins and they kicked us out, not one of us here would say the other team we hammer 6-1 deserves it lol.

{Ed007's Note -. Legia received the standard punishment for for fielding an ineligible player, their opponents (Celtic) were awarded a 3-0 win and so we qualified on away goals with a 4-4 aggregate result, I'd say that had a pretty big bearing on the result. Legia weren't kicked out the competition, they went out on the away goals rule, do you understand that?
So how did you expect UEFA to keep Legia in the competition without us forfeiting it?
And if Celtic made the same stupid mistake I would be fuming but I'd like to think we're far too professionally ran not to know if a player is banned or not.}

30 May 2018 20:37:05
Tesla369. There is no way we should have given way to Legia.
If an athlete gets caught taking drugs, you wouldn't let him keep his medal by arguing that he would have won the race without taking drugs, that has got nothing to do with it.
We may have got lucky on that occasion, but it's not up to a club who followed the rules to take the side of a club who broke them.
Would you say that if we were to win a match with a controversial penalty in the last minute that we should ask the authorities to change the result if it was shown later to be a wrong decision? . This is what you seem to be arguing for.

30 May 2018 20:41:50
Tesla369 I do not know if you know this but Legia blamed a female member of their office staff and SACKED her, hardly the actions of a team with virtue.

30 May 2018 21:03:19
But we had a handicap that no other team taking part had,

30 May 2018 21:53:28
good point Timalloy.
The club secretary is usually the responsible person for ensuring procedures and paperwork are in order. That, would surely include keeping track of bans, rule compliance etc.
I think the original intent of the post was that he felt Celtic should have shown some sympathy.
The question is WHY?
They made a "schoolboy" error by bringing on a player who was not eligible to play. Not rocket science.
As previously pointed out, Legia were given the mandatory punishment.
If Celtic had not scored then Legia would still have gone through even with the punishment.
Bottom and basic line. They cheated and we benefited.

30 May 2018 21:59:50
Timalloy Legia knew she wouldn't have the balls to stand up to them.
Tesla369, if you are just a supporter of Scottish Football, I sympathise. With the fact in your association Rangers 1872 and Rangers 2012 cheat with impunity .
Rangers are and were above the laws.

30 May 2018 23:24:10
There was absolutely no need for Ed and his "do you know that? " condescending patter.

Also adding things I never suggested. I never once said we should have thrown ourselves out of the tournament.

I'm saying we should have been aware that UEFA would have kicked Legia out regardless and it would have been respectful and good sportsmanship from our end to admit that as a club we recognise that Legia beat us fair and square and we didn't feel they got an advantage.

an 88 minute sub when we are 6-1 down is not an advantage, we got beat fair and square and It would have been good to admit that and give our condolences to Legia before we moved on to the next round.

However our club hit out with things about being disappointed in Legia appealing even though we would have appealed in the same position. I felt our attitude was disrespectful.

{Ed007's Note - Did you say this?:

"Our board should have done the decent thing and asked UEFA to keep Legia in."

That's all you need to answer, a simple yes or no question.}

31 May 2018 06:05:00
Nevermind the bollox. They broke the rules by being incredibly naive and we capitalised. Are we in the sympathy game now?

31 May 2018 07:43:58
Europe next season, their must be improvement defensively. We will see the usual "we need to spend 10 billion" patter

but it's not stopped the likes of BATE qualifying as much as us and on a fraction of our budget.

there is zero excuse for conceding 6/ 7 goals a game as regularly as we do against big sides.

We weren't outspending them in the past when getting some decent results so makes no sense why we can't now.

No reason why we can't be a solid Europa league side like Ajax or Marseille have been recently.

31 May 2018 09:08:27
Legia broke the rules. End of. We should have let them go forward? Feck me, talk about bollocks?

The mental season is well and truly here.

31 May 2018 09:43:21
Yes Ed, as said state that we didn't deserve to go through (which we didn't)

Say to UEFA we supported Legia to go through if possible. Which UEFA wouldn't have done anyway.

Then our club don't look like a desperate, greedy and low level.

We got hammered 6-1 on the pitch, 11 vs 11. The broken rule on the 88th min of the 2nd leg had zero impact on the result.

FC Sion game was different, they played 5 players that were not supposed to play and that impacts the result.

Even at that though losing to the likes of Sion was embarrassing as well.

{Ed007's Note - So how could we have asked UEFA to keep Legia in the tournament without us forfeiting our place?}

31 May 2018 11:40:44
Tesla369. We are talking about a situation where millions of pounds are at stake. It's not the egg and spoon race at a school sports day.
If I drive at 35mph in a 30 limit, I can't argue that I shouldn't get fined because it was only slightly over the limit and nobody was hurt. The rule is there and it's nobody's fault but mine if I get caught.
I don't imagine that the rest of the clubs in the competition would have been too impressed if Legia had been allowed through after breaking the rules. They would then think that they could break the rules without sanction. It would lead to chaos.

31 May 2018 12:31:44
Simple Ed, UEFA were going to enforce the rule regardless of what we thought of it.

So even if we shown support for Legia we would still go through, still have a chance to get CL money.

However we would have also gained respect for publicly supporting a team which fairly beat us.

So it was a win/ win for us to support Legia cos we wouldn't have had to give up our spot even if we wanted to.

It's a more sportsman and diplomatic thing to do, to show respect to a team who played very well and had us chasing shadows.

{Ed007's Note -

via GIPHY

31 May 2018 14:40:13
Good response mate, enjoy your 12th birthday next week.

{Ed007's Note -

via GIPHY

30 May 2018
New image uploaded to the
Celtic Player Sightings page entitled, Edouard value immediate drop

30 May 2018 11:34:59
With all this talk of McGinn potential coming to us. IMO it's a no brainer. The guy is a talent and will be an ideal replacement for Armstrong (should he leave) .
I'm sure someone mentioned the other day about McGinn being a box to box player and that's what we need.
We simply can't compete with the way clubs in Europe are spending cash. We have to take a chance on McGinn or any other signings as we can't afford the Top ready made player.
Keep the faith guys the Future is Green and White. 🍀🍀.

30 May 2018 12:25:43
Think all the guys saying McGinn is not good enough, or not experienced enough, or only looks good because he is playing for Hibs, and will only ever be a squad player, were the same ones saying the same thing about Griffiths, if we do sign him, I would expect him to establish himself as a first team regular pdq.

{Ed007's Note - If his name was Juan McGinnio they'd all be creaming their boxers. There's people admitting they have hardly watched him but they know he isn't good enough? Hhhmmmm (chinrub)

30 May 2018 13:55:05
Chinrub ED. We signing him?

{Ed007's Note - (facepalm) I don't think the wee emoji things are working lol.}

30 May 2018 13:46:16
I was thinking that the other day Ed. People are looking down their noses because he’s Scottish and plays in the SPFL. Look at the leagues a lot of our other players past and present came from- Lustig-Norwegian league Ajer-Norwegian league? Armstrong-SPFL Brown-SPFL Wanyama- Belgian league Ki- K-league and Tom Rogic wasn’t even playing the same sport😂

Generally we have to look at players playing in smaller leagues who stand out and hope they can step up for us.
I can’t see Armstrong staying and I think Mcginn would be a great replacement.

30 May 2018 14:06:25
With Alan, Armstrong, Biton, Benyu probably all leaving McGinn would be a great signing.

30 May 2018 15:55:54
Benyu isn't leaving probably another season on loan.

30 May 2018 18:02:23
McGinn has potential there's no doubt about it, but we will be paying over the odds for another player that might not make it into our first 11.

There are more options available to us from leagues as competitive as the SPL.

Lovro Majer would of been an excellent piece of business but other clubs will have a better chance of signing him.

Luka Lukovic of Backa in the Serbian 1st division would be an excellent option, 2 years younger than McGinn and contributed more in his domestic league, also would pick him up for half the price giving us extra funds to strengthen our weaker areas (RB, RW)

I'm hoping Mark Hill will develop and eventually break into the 1st team in the future as well as Ewan Henderson who I rate very highly.

31 May 2018 07:38:46
hes a gentleman too he will be great with the fans like kt is, two well brought up gents, and two of our own.

30 May 2018 08:22:23
A quite excellent thread regarding the signing of McGinn, just catching up, surely this is exactly the type of signing we should be making. Looking at him he is clearly a 'Rodgers type', fast, a goal threat and young with plenty in the tank.

Some debate on him dominating v us, maybe dominate is too strong but he has certainly showed up. If Armstrong goes it would be insane to lose out. For me his biggest strength his taking you up the pitch, much like Armstrong he is a very aggressive runner who commits defenders. For me the boy is ready.

30 May 2018 08:58:22
I'm not opposed to signing him as I think he is a decent player. However, my only concern is the fee, as I don't think he is worth 3 million when you consider he is going into the last year of his contract.

Personally I would offer no more than 1.75 million plus Scott Allan. If they don't take it I would wait until January and make a reduced offer and then sign him on a pre-contract if they don't take the offer.

If he goes to another club for a greater fee then so be it.

30 May 2018 09:55:48
@RAW. Kinda agree with your valuation but surely it's a bit bisciut tinny? I think we could go 2m plus add ons and Allen and he ours.

30 May 2018 10:30:25
I was told that celtic will sign Mcginn and loan him back to Hibs. Seems a win win situation.

30 May 2018 11:46:22
Plenty in the tank sir and a bloody good shot! He would be a simply lovely signing.

30 May 2018 13:55:36
Great post Steph.

31 May 2018 22:08:58
If we sign McGinn, I hope there is no question of lending him back, he has been at Hibs long enough under N Lennon . We haven't got the resources of an. EPL side that we can buy a 23 yr old and hire out .
I wouldn't concern myself about what price we pay, if we buy him for £1.5 m and he is v poor, then he is a bad buy . If we give £4 m and he is v good then he would be a cheap buy .
Up to PL and B R to decide on our valuation.

30 May 2018 00:33:32
dundee united in for aitchison on loan.

30 May 2018 08:24:41
For some reason i don't think BR has seen it in him. Could have been in lots of games last season but Johnson and Henderson seem to be more advanced now.

30 May 2018 09:08:53
Think this would be a good move as the lad needs game time.

I'm not sure that Rodgers does not fancy him.

What we need to remember is Rodgers is trying to keep Dembele, Edouard and Griffiths happy, which is the priority as Aitcheson is not better than any of them at the moment. That is not to say he won't develop into a good player for us.