Celtic banter 7

15 Jul 2026 17:32:17
This is probably a stupid question, but I honestly don't know. Does the members of the Celtic board get a bonus for how much money is in the Celtic account?. Only reason I am asking is I can't for the life of me figure out why they hold onto as much money.

And apart from the team there is parts of Celtic park needing attention that seems to get missed. Then I think of last season where a blind man could see we needed some money spent on players before the CL qualifiers yet they couldn't wake up to make it happen.

15 Jul 2026 18:12:17
I know lawwell and Nicholson did but unsure about the rest. However, I'm sure they all benefit from high share price.

15 Jul 2026 17:00:29
Someone needs to tell Desmond that even the prices in Poundland have gone up and tupence gets you sweet fa these days.

15 Jul 2026 16:35:49
Sir David Murray bought Rangers FC for £6M on November 23rd 1988 and then Sold them for £1 on May 6th 2011.

During his 8199 days at the club he achieved 36 honours of which 17 were tainted EBT honours.
2 tainted honours from the Wee Tax Case and 15 tainted honours from the Big Tax Case.

It took Celtic only 15 days to win our first honour after Minty Sold Rangers with the 2011 Scottish Cup.
15 years later since Sir David Sold the old Ibrox club for £1,
Celtic have now Won 31 major honours in only 5496 days when we beat Dunfermline in the SC Final.
That’s exactly only two thirds of the time (67%) from the whole Minty era at Ibrox.

Only 5 honours short but with 8 years to spare and all that success without any Cheating.
Karma she is playing a blinder and long may it continue.

15 Jul 2026 16:58:37
When the BBC done an investigation into Oldcos use of EBTs, I recall one of their old directors, a Mr Adams, saying they were using other schemes prior to the DoS but he did not elaborate. If true, the cheating goes back further than we think.

15 Jul 2026 17:00:15
Would have interesting if Ayr United had not turned him down Buzz, ruined Scottish hockey and Scottish basketball before turning his meglamaineyism to football. Stiffed the taxpayers for a billion, cee u next Tuesday of a man.

15 Jul 2026 17:12:54
Wonderful!

15 Jul 2026 17:39:49
Former Director Hugh Adam mentioned in the early 2000s that Bankruptcy was “the logical conclusion” due to Minty’s business strategy and he was ridiculed for his views.

We know for definite Rangers FC cheated for at least 12 years and now Sevco Scotland FC have been in the doldrums for the last 14 Years and counting.
Absolutely No Sympathy because they still won’t admit they received a sporting advantage even though their old Manager Alex McLeish admitted they did receive a sporting advantage.
Plus the Supreme Court Verdict confirmed McLeish was right.

Looking at the big picture and everything that’s happened,
I would be surprised in hindsight if any Ibrox fans would keep the Minty Golden years because I’m sure the vast majority will be wishing he was never allowed near their old club in 1988.
Why else would they strip his name from the training ground.

15 Jul 2026 17:47:31
Buzz think of it this way oldco went bust in 2012 newco then came through the leagues and 3_4 years ago reached a ueropean final what does that say about our boards ambition in a one horse race.

{Ed007's Note - It tells you the board wouldn't spunk £144m up the wall and have practically hee-haw to show for it.}

15 Jul 2026 18:24:53
The point i'm trying to make ed is if we are pointing out everyone elses flaws regarding clubs we really need to start looking closer to home. let's say for hypothetical sake hearts had won the league do you think going into champions league playoff and season starting they would be in as poor a shape as we are.

we knew last season we needed better and the board have no ambition to match the fans or the great club we support and follow.

{Ed007's Note - I can't realistically answer that, we aren't due to play the CL game for another month where as Hearts play Strum Graz next week. They've lost their manager, top striker and one of their main midfielders to TRIFC and their data analysis/set-piece coach to us, they've spent circa £2m on a selection of 10 Action Man heeds and a manager nobody had heard of.
Celtic will have new players in before the CL qualifier and people saying otherwise are just moaning for the sake of moaning, coincidentally it's a lot of the same people that said we wouldn't win the league and would be lucky to come third 🤷‍♂️

15 Jul 2026 18:44:12
Edd are the cream buns in £144m of debt and if so is ther any chance they can die AGAIN🙏.

{Ed007's Note - No mate, that's their total losses since they were founded in 2012.

According to TRIFC latest published accounts:

They had around £1.8 million in bank loans outstanding.

The total interest-bearing debt was £21.8 million, made up mainly of:

~£16.3 million in investor loans.
~£3.6 million in other commercial/bank borrowing.
~£1.9 million in lease liabilities.

They had a recent share issue that rasied £16m which wasf fully subscribed by existing shareholders meaning the Delaware consortium gained more power (and secrecy) over the smaller shareholders and to keep them in line with UEFA's FSR.}

15 Jul 2026 18:44:58
Sevco were close to success under a good Manager GVB but Celtic were lucky we had Ange that season.
But typically the Ibrox bosses did the dirty on GVB with their genius Beale and now Karma has worked more of her magic ever since.

You’re right about the Celtic Board’s ambition and that’s why we haven’t won a European knockout tie in 22 years and counting.

Myself and other Celtic Supporters must also share the blame for such a poor European record.
We were too obsessed with domestic success and 10 in a row Etc that we believed Europe was only a bonus at best.

I still wouldn’t change our Quadruple Treble success but that European record is embarrassing for a club that’s used to winning.

{Ed007's Note - GVB was the best manager they've had, Buzz but he was too nice a guy for them, they need a raving lunatic that buys into their warped mindset or he'll never last.

15 Jul 2026 19:38:16
Ed your honest opinion. where do you see the future going with this current board in charge, or do you see or have heard any murmurings about anyone out there wantint to buy celtic.

{Ed007's Note - In my honest opinion I think there is something going on behind the scenes, whether it's Haughey or even the Boston Celtics guy I don't know but a few things don't sit right, Wilson is still interim chairman with no hints or rumours about a permanent one, MON getting the job for a year and just basically everything being short term.
The problem is that this board are happy just to be top dogs in Scotland whereas the reality is we have outgrown the Scottish game in a way that David Murray could only dream of at Ibrox, I honestly put it down to some kind of fear, I genuinely think that the people running our Club are scared to spend/speculate and invest incase it backfires. Do any of them have any experience at all of running a football club let alone one bringing in £140m+ a year in revenue - does that make sense?
Think of it like this, as JFP says on the pods regularly, "Sometimes you need to know what you don't know to progress"...
Say I won £200m on the lottery and decided to try and buy DD out, that's where my involvement should end, I don't know how to run a football Club but I'd go out and get the best CEO & DOF that I can afford to do that and all I need then is someone I trust representing me on the board to make sure it's all above board

16 Jul 2026 04:09:39
I know I’m bit late to party on this, but buzz I’m sure the ebts only went back so far because that as far as computer the fraud squad took after bomsung, before that it was stored on paper files which were prob burnt.

16 Jul 2026 08:17:42
I think the first Ebt used was Craig Moore in September 1999 with a DOS Ebt.

Rangers won the double that season with Moore playing more than half the league games and 4 Scottish Cup ties including the Final.
That’s why those 2 tainted honours should be stripped alongside the 15 tainted honours from the Big Tax Case which started in 2001.

Craig Moore, Tore Andre Flo and Ronald DeBoer were the 3 players that used the DOS EBT’s from 1999 to 2001.
That was known as the Wee Tax Case owing £2.8M which was never ever paid.

15 Jul 2026 20:26:05
Alot of good points there ed i'm a dinosaur when speaking in business terms. but i scratch my head at supposedly bussiness people who are smart and world class as everything they do have been year after year regarding recruitment, getting a dof upgrading and trying to make Celtic the best it could possibly be now look incompetent and amauteurish at best.

thank you for your input and reply much appriciated ed.

{Ed007's Note - 👍🏻🍀

15 Jul 2026 21:38:56
Excellent replies Edd.

{Ed007's Note - 👍🏻🍀

15 Jul 2026 21:23:17
You hit the nail on the head ed, the board are terrified of messing up, as was evidenced when Ross Desmond said we can't afford to swing and miss. It is impossible to make good decisions when you are in fear.

{Ed007's Note - 👍🏻🍀

15 Jul 2026 11:51:52
Just hear me out.
The history books will show, domestically, complete dominance in the last 15/ 20 years.
You have to include Rangers problems in that because that's apart of the history.
That domestic dominance however came at the cost of no progress in Europe.
We should have been in a position to run the team to do both.
I know we aren't going to win the CL but there should have been progress. when we thought there were signs of progress, the board circled the wages in and periods of down sizes kicked in.
As a fan I could only imagine what it would be like to have a board that would be on the ball with the way a modern football club should be run.
The men's first team should be the number one priority.
As I have said before I would scrap the academy. Its now producing players to leave at 16 and the ones left clearly aren't good enough.
DD has been holding the club back for years.


He had it in a decent state.
All he had to do was modernise the board and the workings off the club but he decided on rolling his sleeves up and wanting to fight with the supporters and his stubbornness and I truly think, hatred of the support leaves us in the place we are today.
The business might look good, the trophy Hall the same, but we should be so much further on than we are.
That's the frustrating part.
For some reason we are being held back.
Through in the stadium being tired now. many areas need modernising.
We now have a manager that's older than the board members.
We have at least 5 maybe up to 10 players who will struggle to complete 90 minutes for a variety of reasons.
Yet I have still brought my 2 season tickets.
I love going to watch celtic. i love our history, love our club.
The question I have to you all.
Why are they doing this.

15 Jul 2026 12:30:15
You cannot scrap the academy or womans team. Both are required for domestic and European licenses.

15 Jul 2026 13:34:42
Fair enough about the academy, but with the laws since brexit it's just a playground for the epl to take any that's half decent.
Its waste of time and money.

15 Jul 2026 13:53:51
My feelings exactly JJ. I don't understand why we are being held back in fulfilling our potential. Our Club should be run like a well oiled machine, players leave with replacements lined up, strive to become better every season. Instead the footballing side of things is run like an old clapped out motor.

15 Jul 2026 15:54:27
It's because Michael Nicholson is actually agent orange.

15 Jul 2026 17:06:35
Celtic who see themselves as a bank and merch brand, rather than a football club. That's the reason we are held back. We aren't a serious football club.

15 Jul 2026 11:13:27
MON "Hopeful of new players coming in"

"Nicholson is working as fast as he can to sign players, why yesterday I saw 6 second class stamps on his desk ready to put on envelopes with offers for players, he hopes to hear back in the New Year".

15 Jul 2026 09:51:10
Just off the back of last nights friendly.
Let’s not forget sporting were UCL quarter finalists.
Only just got put out by arsenal 1-0 the premier league champions.
Their buying power is substantially higher than Celtics.

We certainly need a whole new midfield though!

15 Jul 2026 10:32:13
We don’t buy very much, that’s the whole problem 🤔.

15 Jul 2026 11:08:35
The Motherwell boys rumour has went very quiet, evn players that are at WC are getting signed by other teams, a pre season is all about getting players in to get fit and used to environment and systems.

Ineacheo is apparently training with sum1 but he was doing that last yr and still unfit, he is the best finiisher in Scotland get the deal done and get him and at least 90% fit.

15 Jul 2026 11:08:53
A couple of loans and maybe get Iheanacho and Saracchi for a year, whilst selling Maeda and Engels and that will be our whack. Seen this movie too many times.

15 Jul 2026 11:31:38
Need centre defenders and midfielders.

But Sporting youths showed us up big time friendly or not.

15 Jul 2026 12:40:27
Celtic deservedly beat Sporting 2-0 this time last year but yet 4-1 flattered us 12 months later.

15 Jul 2026 09:26:32
Serious question in light of all that’s going on in and around Celtic fc. Are our board so well insulated from the support unrest, that they are oblivious to the reasoning behind the collective, not another penny, and all the other background complaints like the AGM fiasco.

Have they just looked at season ticket sales and taken that as a pat on the back to carry on with business as usual. Can’t get the image of out of my head of one of Eddie Murphy, s characters walking around with his fingers in his ears chanting NAH NAH NAH I’m not listening.

15 Jul 2026 10:37:37
If Dermot Desmond ran his other businesses the way he runs Celtic he’d be skint, he is not bothered about the club at all, Nicolson and McKay are just corporate monkeys dancing to his tune, the fact that they are happy to let the taxman fill his boots does not show good business strategy, Nicolson gets £17k a week for what exactly 🤔.

15 Jul 2026 11:14:34
I think they know about the unrest but believe it is just a small minority, as was evidenced by Ross desmonds speech at the AGM.

I personally don't think they care what we think as long as we keep giving them our hard earned cash and the stocks price is ok.

With regards to how Desmond runs the club. On the most part he runs the club well financially and has built a strong foundation. The problem some of us have, is that he is ultra conservative and risk averse, which is fine during lean times as fans will accept that but as we are seeing now, many of us are frustrated that he is unwilling to try and gradually take us to the next level.

There is so many things that the club could be doing to improve us but are reluctant to try.

15 Jul 2026 07:09:54
O'Neil-Nicholson is busting a gut in the background 🥵🤮.

15 Jul 2026 08:12:57
Read that! Nicholson working away in the background 🙈🙈🙈 what was more worrying was the indication that players need to leave to bring players in?

The still talking to kels and interest in another arajou loan!

15 Jul 2026 09:56:31
Who is actually working on players who were not here last season.

15 Jul 2026 05:20:32
If we had won 4 1 would we be world beaters? Yes signings required. That game is a zero indication and tells us nothing that wasn't apparent before. On a plus Camilo! I'm still fearful but optimistically so. I know how dare I be!

15 Jul 2026 06:01:16
Last year there was a ridiculous level of hype after we beat Newcastle 4-0 which was then quickly dampened by a average Ajax team
that was at a similar level of fitness.

All I have seen from the 2 friendlies so far is that Celtic have done nothing and still look like a team void of ideas and ability.

15 Jul 2026 08:07:40
Don't worry kwaj, the Celtic board will beat that out of you. 🤣

Believe it or not, last summer I was really optimistic. Our squad had been trimmed, we had a top manager, had just gotten out of group stages on CL and gave Bayern a good game, we were the richest we had ever been, we had good sellable assets and were in a great position to kick on.

Up until we crashed out the CL, which was late in the window, I had been telling people on here, that the time to judge was at the end of the window and that I was confident we would strengthen. Sadly, I had let my optimism over cloud my judgement and the club failed miserably in relation to ruitment and it snowballed from there. It was just one deck up after another.

15 Jul 2026 09:46:06
It's pretty season for god sake it means heehaw, the first half we were decent and popped it about quite nice 2nd half obviously with the raft of changes it happens, complete over reaction.

15 Jul 2026 11:41:04
Easily pleased Mally if your content with what you are seeing.

Whatever happened to Celtic don’t play friendlies or does that only apply when they win.

Pre season in the main is about fitness, Sporting players looked far fitter and sharper than ours? Played far better than us and looked like a team.

4-1 defeat that easily could have been double figures is nothing to ignore.

15 Jul 2026 14:47:04
Did I say I was happy feck it's pre season results are immaterial.

15 Jul 2026 03:20:16
How lazy is our recruitment and how slow is it, we had saratchi iheanacho and ox in the building but let them leave without getting a deal done, now we're being linked with aurejo feck me why have scouts be as well paying them all off if that's all we've got.

15 Jul 2026 06:45:45
It is so true. Since Ang left, our recruitment efforts have been abysmal. Slow, backwards looking and without any planning for the immediate dangers (CL qualifiers, being ready for the new season etc) and giving new players time to get settled in whatever playing style we will be playing.

As things stand, and with the players we have left, or will retain, we are weak everywhere and those potential CL qualifying opponents look daunting as of 15 July.

15 Jul 2026 10:05:26
Looking back the only reason things got done under Ange was that most of the players we signed were very cheap, so the boards heart monitors hardly recorded a bleep.

Now we are being asked to spend serious money just to stand still and the board room sounds like a Teco checkout.

It is embarrassing when teams ask 10m and we start at 3m. I know its a negotiation but we appear to lose so many players by going on very low and leaving it at that offer for far too long.

I may be wrong but my biggest concern is how easy it seems for the clubs in our league to get the players in they need. I appreciate it may be a different pool that they are fishing in but they still get the job done quickly and are still up against clubs with similar budgets, just like us.

16 Jul 2026 18:15:24
The under cutting approach on making offers is not good business practice. You alienate people.

14 Jul 2026 22:32:25
Groundhog day with signings
Linked to about 20 players probably get 2 at most then on last day of transfer window sign loan players who no one wants
World class football club in everything but doing what fans want
Optimism at all time low after getting over the line last year we should be in commanding position
Really feel for MON alongside the greats who have managed this wonderful club
Board are a shambles and need to go.

15 Jul 2026 07:16:50
Im with you Agreed, but how?

Our collective moaning affects nothing but our own sunny perspectives.