Neil Lennon **The Official Thread**

As I said I liked Ki but the way some folk on here are going on about him its like he is Andrea Pirlo on steroids

 

Trying to compare Wanyama to Ki is pretty pointless. They are two completely different players. In Europe, we were crying out for someone to put their foot on the ball and spray a few passes about, because we don't have anyone capable of doing it at present. The game against Barcelona is not a game suited to a Ki type of player, it was a night for workers, as we were always going to be on the back foot and chasing for the majority of the game. But when you look at the game in Lisbon, a decent ball player could have opened them up, and we didn't have one.

 

Ki scored a great goal in the Scottish Cup Final.

 

Mainly circumstances, the only footballing side we came up against was Barcelona who we just defended against greatly and won.

Benfica, who I still dont think are very good even though they made the final just arent that good. They dont play very good football either, they are attacking but dont keep the ball well and have some poor players in their team. And Spartak who we beat home and away arent that good a football team either, both Benfica and Spartak are fairly open teams though who will attack you.

If we had Ajax and Steau Bucharest or Basel in our Group we'd probably have finished bottom as they wouldnt have given us a kick of the ball and we wouldnt have defended as much against them as we did against Barca because theyre not as good a team as them.

We done well in Europe but we'll struggle against anyone who keeps the ball well and passes it about quick.

Teams like Benfica and Spartak we are suited to playing because their laid back, slow paced style.

 

Back on topic please. This is not a Ki thread.

 

Ki was * * for us. He looked like the player we all know he can become with us in spells but lets call a spade a spade he * pussied out too much. see all this balls hes the asian steven gerard when he joined got me excited i was expecting someone to crash into challenges ruffle feathers and get a good days hard work out of did we get it with him? No we didnt well not consistant enough anyway lennon punted him for 6 mill great bit of business like a previous poster said kayal on form ledely and wanayama no chance hed make my team with them 3

For the record i still think ki will be a smashing footballer just not suited to our team or scottish football in general grafters r needed and tbh thats why we have been so * at times this season too too many ppl runnin about with their heads up their holes that is my critisism of lennon and my only one he is too pally with these guys my buddy kris my pal gaz * that give it the stein treatment the ferguson treatment make them fear u and have johan be the pal, the inbetween guy

 

What were people expecting out of us this season? What expectations had you placed on Neil Lennon? What was the minimum?

Mines was win the league, get into Europe and give ourselves a good showing and for a good cup run.

People seem to think that we couldn't hold onto the ball in Europe, go check our stats. It certainly wasn't retaining position that caused our failure in the last 16, we had more of the ball at home to Benfica and both games against Spartak. Barcelona held onto it better than us but what are folk expecting there?

We've spent the rest of the season experimenting really but it has still been a succesful, thouroughly enjoyable season all round for me. We haven't played with the same intensity that we have the last two years and that is something we need to rectify. Looking at where we were under Tony Mowbray, to where we are now? It's lightyears between us.

 

This!

There are some severely delusional people on here who don't seem to realize we're in a * league in a small country that has systematically mismanaged it's football development over the past two or three decades largely due to our main rival who disemboweled themselves for the sake of a few trophies. Despite this, through reasonably shrewd management, we sacrificed early on-field success (an uneven field at that) for a stable business platform that has allowed us to see quite remarkable European success over the last decade and left us with what is a talented, valuable group of young players that won the league handsomely, are in a cup final and reached the last 16 of the CL. It makes me wonder what it would take to stop the * - winning every game 5-0 while passing the opponent off the park? Yes, we're Celtic. Yes, we have great history. But you need to realize that it's just that, history. The current reality is we're trying to build a BMW on a Fiat budget and there are people here complaining that we aren't a Ferrari.
Rant over.

 

I wanted to get into the CL Groups and try and win both Cups that would be the priority, the League would take care of it's self. We exceeded my expectations by getting to the Last 16, although we never won the other Cup these things happen.

I would like to see more tactics deployed though and less messing about from one formation to the other every week.

 

Your minimum expectation was The Treble? That just isn't viable for me.

 

Why not? We had more than enough in our locker to see off St Mirren and Hearts, and should be able to beat Hibs in the Cup final. That's all it would have taken this year. That wee bit extra effort that was missing vs St Mirren was all that stood between us and a very realistic shot at the Treble.

 

Wasn't a minimum expectation but I thought there was a good chance but we done too well in Europe that it wasnt a priority and we got knocked out.

If we get knocked out Europe next season in the Group Stage then we'll have a great chance of the Treble again next season, we have actually almost won the Treble every season under Lennon only 1 or 2 games a season have cost us it.

Season 1 the Hun Cup final and Inverness League game
Season 2 the Kilmarnock final and Hearts semi
Season 3 the St Mirren semi

If we'd won just those 5 games we could have done 3 trebles in a row. We've not been that far at all compared to most seasons.

 

Never said this but I agree with you 100% here, absolutely spot on

 

How many times has it been done in our history? The minimum expectation you set on Neil Lennon's shoulders is to do something that is almost unique?

Nah, that's bollocks. I wanted us to win it and we should have beat St Mirren and go on to lift it, I'm dissapointed we didn't but I'm not going into the season saying he should win it, it's failure if he doesn't. My expectations aren't quite that high.

 

I never said it was a minimum expectation.

The only reason it was rarely done before as its really hard to go through an SPL season without slipping up domestically atleast 10 times and if too many are in the League you dont win the League if any are in the Cups you dont win the Cups.

But now we dont have to worry about the League, we can sacrifice League games to concentrate on the Cups so its less difficult than its ever been.

Only thing that * it this season was we done too well in Europe, we had 12 European games which makes domestic slip ups more probable and it happened against St Mirren in the semi.

If we get KOd in the European groups next year then there's a great chance of the treble, unless we get knocked out a Cup while still concentrating on Europe.

 

But you have to remember that Neil Lennon is the first manager in Celtic history that has not had at least one other team capable of challenging for the trophies.