Lee O'Connor

Seems very strange that he’s not with the squad at all for pre-season, especially given our lack of defensive options. Doesn’t say a lot for how he’s rated if other youth defenders are ahead of him in the pecking order.

It was always a low risk move for us signing him, but seems strange when he was so highly thought of at Man Utd and Ireland.

 

Tbf to be Captain of Man U reserves to Celtic reserves to a loan a Partick was probably not how he envisaged his career progressing.

But, when you hear Lenny talk about how he couldn’t leave Frimpong out, if a O’Connor was as good as people say then why aren’t we hearing that about him.

 

Is it confirmed he’s not with the squad?

 

Are you suggesting that the problem might be with the player rather than everyone else?

 

Agreed. He can either feel sorry for himself that Frimpong was signed at the same time and has outshone him, or he can put the work in to earn his chance. That’s on him, not Lenny or the coaching staff.

 

Frimpong was being considered ahead of O'Connor before either of them even kicked a ball with Celtic . I remember Lennon being interviewed the morning after deadline day and he said that frimpong would immediately start training with the first team squad and O'Connor would initially go with the reserves

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Aye and that can’t be argued with, look at the impact Frimpong has made.. O’Connor should have been a class above at Thistle too and by all accounts didn’t really stand out in a team that were relegated from the division..

I’m not writing him off and loan deals can be hit or miss, but maybe the issue is with his attitude if as some say his ability isn’t in question.

 

The young lad is from Waterford, lived in Manchester last few years and over 10 days of the window was suddenly moving to Scotland, a lot of changes for a young lad. He played international football and assisted a goal in his debut in Lansdowne road, he spoke in the link above about how he found it hard to adapt scoring for the u21s v Sweden or making his debut in front of whatever attendance versus then suddenly being playing friendlys with 50 people watching for the reserves. Then he's sent to a club who are struggling in a league he probably knows nothing about, very hard for a young lad to really shine in those circumstances, he needs a loan asap to an spl team where he can be treated like maybe hickey was at hearts (given a chance ) I promise Celtic fans will not regret it if this lad is appropriately managed, he's gonna be a top class talent I just hope it's in the hoops

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Hope you’re right, aye loans can be hit or miss..

I’m not writing him off and love to see young Irish talent coming through.. but if he wants to make it with us he’ll need to get used to the not some glamorous aspects of the Scottish game, maybe Thistle loan was a bit of a reality check fir him..

But aye a better calibre off loan may be best to get him the game time.

 

Ye there definetely could be an element of "what the f*CK am I doing here" when he landed at thistle, but I don't know . Maybe he expected things to move faster at Celtic, when he looks at the likes of Brandon Williams a player he was considered a lot better at at United it would be a natural to get a bit frustrated . But that's professional football

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I get your point but when you see Ralston playing every week at St Johnstone I think there were better moves he could of got.

Yeah I'd have him battling it out with Frimpong, with Elhamed moving in to centre half although can see him playing RB in tougher games. Theres a space in squad with Bauer away for me I'd have hoped O'connor would of filled that or at very least be given chance to

 

While I agree a better loan would of suited him. do you not think Celtic sounded him out as available to loan to clubs? Surely it’s then down to more “suitable” or better clubs coming in and signing him on loan.

The whole reserve system in Scotland needs changed. Players over the age of 18 should be out on loan if they’re not in and around our first team. Whether that loan makes or breaks them as players that’s up to them. I’d love all our young players to make impacts but it just doesn’t happen. one for me that sticks out was Aidan Nesbitt, how highly rated he was and then just fell away. It happens and I think it’s down to the player to ensure it doesn’t

 

I think O'Connor will be ok with or without Celtic because there is definetely a protection of players of this new generation from the fai. So hypothetically if he didn't get a sniff at Celtic In fairness to Celtic covid has altered everything last summer we were putting out Barry coffey at right back in Switzerland and lot of academy players travelled trained and played pre season maybe covid has ruined that this year.

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Yeah they probably did to be fair but would be good if we had more structure to it. I certainly don't think sending him to play under a fat alky who plays long baw fitbaw in a team rock bottom of there league and under immense pressure was the right way to go. It would have been a real culture shock and he was always gonna need 3 or 4 games to adjust to the standard and actually playing 1st team football. The problem was with the pressure on thistle he only got 3 or 4 games and was then dropped as they couldn't afford to let him properly adjust due to being so desperate.

Reserve league in Scotland certainly doesn't help with players development and is huge reason why as a country Scotland doesn't produce anywhere near enough young players. Smaller clubs are too skint to develop better players. What a * up way of thinking that is.

Nesbitt is a cracking example, looked phenomenal at u19 level then a few bad loans to bottom half championship clubs ruined him. Again more suitable loans should have been found to aid his development. Morton was a disaster as all Duffy wanted to do was hump the ball up the park. Hardly the right environment for small, skillful winger to thrive

 

Best way for us to go is forcing through the colts team and implementing it into the divisions starting from the bottom. We then should only play the exact formations the first team play/style they play and make the jump from youth to 1st team not as big a shock. Would also mean we maybe don’t need to send players out to * teams who play * football just for some senior experience.

until the club tries to get this sorted we’ll be having these discussions about the next 10 Lee O’Connor’s

 

Yeah definitely. I really don't get why the club keep trying to force through the colt teams into league 2 when they are never going to get the support. The lowland league or the new West of Scotland league are probably of a better standard than league 2 anyway and think they would be far more welcoming to the idea of a colt team.

 

What’s the new promotion situation from that league to league 2? Or has it even changed? Brains been fried by all the voting/not voting processes.

I actually pretty liked rangers proposals for the colts teams, surprised teams didn’t get behind it

 

The entitlement because O’Connor is Irish is astounding

 

Think from next year its back to a play off between bottom club in league 2 and winners of lowland league/Highland league playoff. New West of Scotland league is level below that.
Aye I thought it was actually a decent idea but from comments on twitter it seems fans of every other club are raging about even the idea of it.
Go a couple of levels below and then they cant do * all about it

 

It's clear as day as the only youth player's being mentioned are O'Connor, Afolabi and Connell..

Funny how the likes of Henderson don't get a mention considering he had a * poor loan and got zero game time after that for us..