Neil Lennon

There's a lot of shoulds there and the implication that wanting to play is selfish is laughable. We all think we can do a good job and Scott Brown will be 100% sure he can play a great game against Hearts. It's Lenny's responsibility to decide if he can or not, it's not Scott Brown's. Picking the team is literally a major part of what he is paid for.

In the highly unlikely event that Broony, even at 36, can't cope with a team from the Championship, the responsibility will be Lenny's.

Also, I'm 43, and so far it seems the older I get, the more I feel time and opportunities slipping away rather than a serene, avuncular willingness to let the young folk have them. If I don't feel that way at 43, I doubt Broony does at 36.
Hardly anyone thinks that way. I remember Cannavaro (probably the best defender at WC 2006) saying in 2008 that he didn't feel old. As it turned out, those two years had in fact made a big difference and I'm sure he realised that in hindsight, but he sure didn't think that at the time.

 

If he brings christie , brown , nhctam back into the team then he risks any progress we have made the last two games

 

So far, I agree totally.

 

Ha, open the quote and look at the italics. I'm clearly not living in this century.

 

The only emotion I feel is pity really, it's such a shame a true legend's status has been allowed to descend into chaotic embarrassment.

The board should have let him ride off into the sunset after a successful Cup final, then hired a proper good European manager.

They took the cheap route as ever and now the manager is suffering more than anyone.

 

Ah. you need to split the quote up to do that, mate. Beyond a certain length, all you see is a preview. I'm not fond of reading my own words either, because I always discover all sorts of spelling and punctuation mistakes, clumsily phrased ideas and occasionally even total incoherence. I hate that, because in my head, my posts are a model of elegant, concise and precise prose. * you for making me read myself!

OK, I'll have a read now.

Edit: you put it all in italics, you muppet.

 

@shieldsybhoy I've read it now and you make a lot of fair points. As I said, I can see both sides of this and a lot of your points are totally valid.

I do still disagree that Broony should go and see Lenny and ask to be dropped. I think that would be a remarkable (and praiseworthy) thing to do if we playing Bayern and he was likely to get bent over; but against Hearts? Come on, mate. There's just no way he's thinking like this and nor would you or I in his place. He's absolutely thinking that he's going to finish what he started (last year's treble) by playing a very good game and running the show comfortably.

 

I don't think any player should have to ask to be dropped unless they're carrying a knock or their head has gone for whatever reason.

Picking the team should be left to the manager alone and he is then accountable if the team picked doesn't do the business.

If Lennon decides Broony is what's needed - for whatever justification he has thought out - and Broony says "Naw, you're wrong, pick Soro"....it undermines the manager.

Personally I'd be picking Soro and Turnbull in the middle all day long but Lennon needs to arrive at that decision through his own appraisal. If he drops them and we lose the game then he's putting his own neck under a guillotine.

 

I find it slightly mind blowing that Broony is a year older than I was when I joined the forum!

 

It didn't suit us, because as I told you, the only club seriously interested in his services in the Summer of 2019 was a club from the A League, that tells you all you need to know about the standard of player he had dropped to. We also had plenty other midfield options & could have went into the market for more, we gave him a 2 year contract out of sheer loyalty, plain & simple. He then cost us tens of millions by sending us out of the CL a couple months later at the expense of Cluj as a reward for that loyalty with an idiotic handball which changed the course of the tie, I mean, who knows what would have happened had we not given him that contract, maybe we would have got past Cluj (where he played a major role in three of the four goals conceded that night) & made it to the CL. We were certainly doing him the bigger favor than the opposite, because if it wasn't for that contract he'd currently be plying his trade in Australia, one of the worst leagues in world football & btw he didn't knock back the A League, he was all set for reluctantly going there until we offered him the 2 year extension, there was never a choice between Australia & Celtic when we offered him the contract.

Playing through injury isn't something to be applauded btw if you know full well that it'll hamper your performance on the park so much that'll therefore also potentially hamper the rest of the teams performance too, especially as a MF where the game can be won or lost, after the 2016 SC semi final against Sevco under Ronny, where he was horrendous, he came out afterwards & said he played through injury even though we had many other fit, non injured midfielders that could have played instead, a selfless player tells the manager in that situation that the injury is affecting his performance levels so badly that he'll be a hindrance to the team, so it'd be better for a fully fit player to fill that role instead.

He didn't quit Scotland early at all, he played until about 32/33, remember he quit & then went back again? Kris Commons quit Scotland early for Celtic, he quit at about 27 & I remember reading articles saying Lenny was telling him to reconsider retiring so early from Scotland.

You're mentioning the word fairness again, I'll tell you about fairness, fairness is rewarding the current players who have played the last two games & achieved long overdue consecutive victories with the chance to continue that form, players like Hazard, Soro & Turnbull, unfairness however would be dropping those players for others who have been in poorer form, if Brown starts the cup final ahead of Soro then the only word I can think of is unfairness.

Actually it's not a riddy & some selfless players do think like that, it's called putting the team before yourself & that's real leadership, an example is Gary Neville as captain under Alex Ferguson, he was getting roasted by wingers he used to have in his back pocket, he wasn't the same player he used to be & knew it, he was embarrassed by his level of performance week after week. Then after a game against West Brom when he had another shocker, he went into the managers office & just said that enough is enough, he admitted he was done, he knew he was letting the team down too often & decided to take himself out of the situation, Gary Neville who had won the CL & multiple EPL titles, had to admit when he felt his time was up, that's not cowardice, that's straight up honesty & you can't do anything else but admire & respect that because it's not an easy decision to take, but it's one you would take for the good of the team if you care about the team more than yourself.

It's not laughable, if you think that you should be playing ahead of a better player in your position who is in better form than you just because of who you are & not about the ability you possess ahead of that player then that is a selfish attitude to have.

Would Brown not have been 100% sure that he'd have a great game at home to Ross County in the LC before having another shocker for the umpteenth time this season & in which ended in defeat? Say what you want about Hearts but they're a far better side than Ross County who have just been badly mismanaged from top to bottom (a bit like us this season). You're absolutely right that it is Lenny's responsibility to pick the team, but it's no secret that Lenny & Brown off the pitch have a personal friendship, imo that can influence Lenny in his decision making to feel even more pressure to select him, in this situation Brown could alleviate that pressure Lenny may feel by letting him know that he won't have a problem if he wants to continue with the same MF that's played the last two games.

Hearts might be in the Championship but they don't have a Championship level squad or team, they have a potentially top six level SPFL team imo if managed properly which they haven't been for a long time, Hearts are a much tougher prospect than Ross County who knocked us out the cup a few weeks ago, underestimating them just because of the league they're in would be foolish, we have to send out the best side we possibly can, anything less than that is cheating the fans.

It doesn't matter how old or not Brown feels in his head, it's about what his body & feet can still do on the park and the evidence of this season is that he's nowhere near the player he used to be, so much so that he's now a liability & hindrance to the starting 11.

 

Shouldn't we play the exact same team we played from our first game in the league until the end of the league because that's the team that started the league off.

What an utterly idiotic vewpoint.

If you share this viewpoint genuinely be ashamed of yourself.

 

Yup, that's a totally idiotic viewpoint. Lucky no one has expressed it!

 

Don't understand this loyalty to Broony argument whatsoever. Does the team who played the quarter final have any say in this? That included Forster who's no here, and half our potential starters weren't even at the club.

Play the team who are most likely to win the match based on current form - that doesn't include Scott Brown. He can have his moment as club captain to lift the trophy should we win it but on the pitch he has been so far off the pace and it's shown with our results this season.

Lennon is off his rocker if he drops Soro for this.

 

I want Lennon to succeed to so bad.

To see Scotland absolutely go nuclear as we claw back and win the title all whilst Lennon is in charge would beat winning the CL with pep as manager for me.

Still want him gone at the end of this season

 

It did suit us. For all that this year is clearly Broony's Lustig moment, last year he captained us to what will probably end up being a 4th treble in a row and to winning our EL group! I'm glad he stayed, although this year I think it should be Soro going forward.

I stopped reading your post at "chose". A long post like that requires a fair time investment and if you are going to construe Broony as deliberately sabotaging our CL qualifier already in the first paragraph, you make me not want to invest that time debating someone who doesn't seem to be arguing in good faith (because you definitely know he didn't). Life is too short.

Perhaps you don't care whether I read it or not, but FWIW if you repost it without any rhetorical untruths like this, I will read it.

 

It didn't suit us because he wasn't a standard of player anymore (hence why his only suitors at the time were teams from the A League) that deserved to be a first team starter every week at our level but we all knew that that would continue to happen given Lenny was the manager. He started the majority of games last season on reputation & status within the squad, not on ability in comparison with others & given Lenny has a personal friendship with Brown off the pitch that also helped his cause too in continuing to start in which another manager with no personal connection to Brown previously wouldn't. He was off the pace in so many big games last season, Cluj in the Qualifier, Copenhagen home & away, Sevco at Hampden & Celtic Park, as well as some league games where his slowing body was giving away daft penalties, if he hadn't stayed we might have got past Cluj as well.

Forster is the very reason we're going for a Quadruple Treble on Sunday & he was also the biggest reason we topped our EL Group last season (according to Juco James on last seasons EL performance he argued that the data showed that had we had a keeper like Barkas, Gordon or Bain over the first five games instead of Forster then the overall performance of the team would have finished 3rd instead of 1st), it's too black & white to say 'he captained us to what will probably end up being a 4th Treble in a row' when his influence in some of the big games wasn't there, the cup final performance against them last season was awful, as I've already said if it wasn't for Forster it would have been one of the most humiliating defeats in our history, how can Brown come away with any credit after a game like that when his own personal performance & the teams was at a shockingly poor level saved by a world class goalkeeping performance?

Fair enough I retract the word 'chose' but no one forced his hand to do that except for him, it just still angers me that he did something as idiotic & inexcusable as that in a game worth tens of millions to the club especially after we gave him a new 2 year contract only a couple of months earlier in which I didn't think he should have been given. I just can't accept the 'rush of blood to the head' or 'moment of madness' argument for it, he was the most experienced player we had on the pitch, he was our captain, things like that shouldn't be happening and for him to go & do something like that which let Cluj back into the tie when we were in control, it was unforgivable. It's not as if it was even a last ditch handball to block a shot off the line that was going in, it was going over his head & potentially out for a throw in to us, it can't be put into words how stupid it was. Not even much maligned players such as Efe Ambrose, Jack Hendry etc did anything as idiotic as that in a Celtic shirt, sure they made some huge, cumbersome errors, but to do something that isn't even in the laws of the game just escapes reason or explanation.

 

Why did we bother playing anyone else last season if Forster was the reason for all our success? Could it be because the other 10 players contributed as well?

I mean far be it from me to supersede your clearly superior knowledge on the subject.

Maybe you could DM John Kennedy and ask him?

 

I said he was the main reason, not the only reason.

The overall performance of the team in the first five games of the EL last season according to the data from Juco James gave up goal scoring chances that neither Gordon, Bain or Barkas would have saved & bailed the team out from time & again, only Forster would. Hence why according to him without Forster last season we don't even get out the group never mind finish 1st.

 

* Juco James. Guys a crank. I can see why you like him though.

I’m out. I’ll leave Random Review to try and decipher your pish.