For once, I'm pleasantly surprised by the boards ambition...(Maybe spoke too soon)

I’m just saying, measuring him as being a target of ours once, while Congerton here (our interest dropping when he left) doesn’t mean he’d be a good player.

Who we actually talking about here btw? Is it Hastie or Aribo?

 

They only averaged 2 points per game(wouldn't get near winning any League with that low a tally) then let almost their whole team go that summer. Goram, Cleland, Gough, Bjorklund, McCall, Gattuso, Gascoigne, Laudrup, McCoist even some of their squad players like Moore, Petric and Durrant were let go.

I'd agree the Celtic team wasn't anything great but Celtic did have a lot of prime players McNamara, Stubbs, Rieper, Weighorst, Lambert, Burley, Larsson, Brattbakk mostly 25-27 with Rieper 29 and Boyd 32 mixed with mediocre players.

Amoruso only played in 5 games and Numan hadn't signed yet. Thern, Bjorklund and Porrini did though.

At the time they probably seemed good as they were old experienced and had been winning but they were obviously done and struggling really. If you were to make an XI of that season in hindsight, how many huns would really have got in the team? you'd probably have gone like...

Gould
McNamara/Gattuso
Stubbs
Rieper
Boyd/Porrini/Bjorklund
Albertz
Lambert
Thern
Burley
Larsson
Negri/Brattbakk

Gould obviously wasnt that good but he done well enough, huns tried dropping Goram who was fat and unfit for Snelders and Niemi but they never broke into the team so much that they signed 2 keepers that summer Klos and Charbonnier.

Defence speaks for it's self, could interchange some as they were all about the same level. Gough and Cleland weren't up to much, same could be said of Annoni and Mahe.

Midfield also, McCall, Gascoigne and Ian Ferguson they rotated a lot as they were all kind of done and not playing well. Thern was their only real first choice centre-mid. For us Burley and Lambert were very good, Weighorst good also but you'd probably go for Thern and Burley.

Wide McNamara played various positions but wide right, Gattuso mostly a wing-back role or right back or midfield you'd pick one of them on the right and Albertz was their best player on the left. Laudrup for them played a mix of wide, attacking mid and up front but he never at his best.

Up front Larsson and Negri again wouldn't be touched except Negri turned * in November/December, you'd probably have picked Brattbakk the last 6 months who scored 10 in 18 compared to Negri's 3 in 14 after New Year.

Personally i'd probably have picked

Gould
Stubbs Rieper Bjorklund
McNamara Lambert Thern Albertz
Burley
Larsson Negri​

 

I do like your rationale, and maybe I was blinded by names such as Albertz, Laudrup Gascougne et al as they had inflicted so much misery on us.

All I know at the start of that season there wouldn't have been many tipping us to win the league, and I include myself in that.

* bless you Wim Jansen.

Edit...and * bless the Feinian squash ball too.

 

A lot of what you say makes sense to me; but as someone who remembers the 90's, IMO even a half fit, overweight, over-the-hill Goram was better than Jonathan Gould.

 

He edited his post regarding Numan to be fair. Still a much better side that’s been made out.

 

It's actually quite scary to see how they strengthened with the help of dodgy tax schemes the following year,

Numan
Van Bronkhurst
Kanchelskis
Guivarch
McCann
Reyna

They spent about 37m!......* knows how they managed to get liquidated!

 

Names don't win trophies though.

Gascoigne and Laudrup may have been big names going into the season but they were physically done as we seen since.

That season the huns were knocked out Europe by Gothenburg(CL) and Strasbourg(EL). Lost the Scottish Cup final against Hearts and were knocked out the other Cup by Dundee Utd. Their League points tally of only 2 per game meant we didnt even have to be that good to beat them. Their points total would have meant for example last season we could have drpped 10 more points and still won the League by a point.

Our Gascoigne and Laudrup going into next season are McGregor and Forrest - there is nochance of them being *, just not going to happen.

It's nothing like us, they were an old team on the slide and actually not very good at the time. We are a youngish team still doing well, they will need to improve a lot to get onto our level.

 

The team that Martin O’Neill won the Treble against cost over £80m to assemble. Ours was about £25m if I remember right

 

They also signed Klos, think they gave him £1million bonus to sign and were paying him like £40k a week which at the time was like the biggest wage in Europe.

£1million signing bonus in 1998 would be like probably giving someone £5million now and the £40k a week was probably near treble what most best players in Scotland would have been on. Would be like us now maybe offering Dani Alves £5million to sign and £90k a week on a free transfer.

 

Yeah a few other names I didn't mention, mental!

Commercial suicide.

The point I am making, I don't want us to be flippant about them and I want us to get our business done. As one of the other lads said very succinctly, with Lenny at the helm you would hope we stay focused.

 

Touch wood so far he seems to be good for another season, thank *; but I think you are underestimating just how important Broony is for us.

 

Which is why I liked the emerging importance of McGregor last year.

 

He is important I think, a wise player good at breaking up play and mopping things up. But now i'd say we have a few better players than him like McGregor, Christie, Tierney, Forrest on their day Edouard and Rogic then theres Ajer whos decent as well and hopefully Jullien. Sinclair less reliable but still capable.

A lot of people seem to be worried about the huns on here but I still dont really see them as a threat.

Realistically they might need to get 90 points to win the League - 12 more points than they got last season, it's a lot more points to get especially when you consider they actually went on a winning run when the League was finished, the pressure was off and teams were coasting to the summer break. Had the pressure been on and any kind of race they'd likely have ended up with even less points than what they'd need to win the League.

There is always the chance we have a mad one and turn out hopeless and only end up with about 80 points, could they get more than 80 points in that case id say maybe but they are not really an 85+ point quality team.

 

Last year they pished all over us at their midden, and both home games for us we underperformed and (I'll whisper this) we got out of jail in the last one.

So realistically all they need to do to get closer is not drop as many points against dross. I personally think they will be improved therefore it's about what we do.

It's not fearing the huns albeit I do believe they will get more points it's about us ensuring we improve again also which I don't think we have thus far.

 

I thought for a period last season we played our best football without brown.

McGregor Christy and Rogic where lethal.

Love Brown and understand how important he is to the team. Rogic is a sick note most of the season but honestly this is the year Brown should be starting to take a back seat.

Saying that we don't see there fitness tests. Milner at Liverpool shows you can still be the fittest and the oldest.

Its a headache and I love Lenny but he has his favourites and it does lead to some strange starting 11s.

Hope we get this window right. * myself about the season ahead but that's nothing new tbf.

 

And he was. Hahaha

 

This is one of those things where I'm going to get pelters and perhaps deservedly so; but I was sitting watching that second half at the weekend thinking CM should have earphones in for friendlies like this with Broony on a mic at the other end, talking him through what dangers were developing and how to change his moment to moment positioning to negate that.

Some of Broony's ability to see the future in that way is starting to approach Roy Keane levels now IMO. Obviously he doesn't quite have Keane's physical strength, I just mean mentally.

 

Oh i see your point haha. Aribo, i think he was mentioned in that leaked document, along with Tommy Smith and Perraud who we also appear to have missed out on.

 

Everything you have said bar the ageing part can happen to us in the next two seasons if we are not careful.

Yes they had some older player but they had some great ones as well.

They * it, thought we could never come back and win the league, underestimating us and look what happened! Who is to say they won’t get some bargains like we did that year, things click into place we don’t strengthen ext.

You can never ever think they won’t get strong again, they thought that of us and look what happened. We should be light years ahead of everyone domestically but in reality we are not.

We have been playing * for the last 18 months, let’s not kid ourselves here yet still managed to limp over the line, we have downgraded for the last couple of seasons and we need major investment this summer.

If the board provided Lennon with the funds and get in quality that we need we will walk it but until then it’s going to be closer again this season.

Just to add names did win trophies, they done it for 9 seasons with big signings yes cheated but still had names, we did with Lennon, Sutton, Hartson and then Larsson came into his own.

 

If Celts soon have £25m landing in their bank account, that would only boost their spending power.

Lennon, though, isn’t expecting to be handed a blank cheque to sign new players.

He said: “I don’t know what the club will do with it.

“We will work within the structure here. Obviously it’s a huge amount of money. We have had discussions, but they haven’t been about Kieran leaving and what we’re going to do with the money.

“We’re working away already on transfers and players we want to bring in.

“Whether we sell Tierney or not that won’t change things. It will help. But we are not in the process of busting the bank.”

That’s Celtic code for the £25m is going into the bank account and not getting touched!