bauhaus

Tel and Mo are aware. Our most natural captain at the back line is injured ( Hogg ), weve used just about everyone else in the back line. Our defensive midfield is out injured ( Cox and Jones ), Our wide midfielders who should stop opponents wing backs from getting forward ( Hayes and Doran ) are out, which also reduces our attacking threat from midfield reducing scoring opportunities and assists. Come on, take out 6 or 7 probable starters from most teams and they will be effected. Certainly the likes of Killie, both Saints, Hibs, Hearts, Arabs, Dons, Motherwell and Dunfermline wouldn't do as well, and Rangers proved against Falkirk they cant do without a few either. Look at the Englandshire league and you see the same happen in the league cup when the EPL clubs leave out several over paid stars, and then struggle or go out against lower league clubs. Toks is still the heart of our club, and is far from " finished". Playing with a different partnership will not help anyone at the moment but what can they do with so many injuries. And if you look at their background, Kenny has been in the UK for years, as has Golobart, should think they know English by now, especially what they need to know. Piermayr being Austrian will likely have a good level of English, as European countries do emphasize the learning of other languages, unlike our good old UK with our totally inward way of thinking.

We all wish that we could have started the season a bit better, but look at the whole story. We have more injuries than fit players it seems. They are slowly starting to get back, and I believe they will make a big difference to our fortunes. We have been shipping goals, but our injuries have played a part in this. When have we played the same team for 2 or 3 games in a row. Defending starts from your strikers, not just the back line. Where has our luck gone, it cant continue where we hit the keeper, or the post and crossbar, or the ball is millimeters away from reaching to score. We have shown in patches what we can do, same as two seasons ago, we struggled at first and then blew everyone away. We are not the worst team in the league, we are better than the Dons and Hibs, who were both lucky to beat us. We will get off the bottom in the next few weeks, and that will give enough confidence for the results to improve and then as we get Johnny, Lee, Arron etc back we will be a force to trouble all the teams in the league. I know what Tel and Mo are trying to do, and it will click. Keep the faith

Laurence, dont type what you dont know. You are just making a fool of yourself.

Fuji

Keep the faith. If we get someone up beside Tade to put it in the net, we will be smiling

Tsunami

Card

Any chance it could clip the top of the Parkhead stand and loosen a bit of scrap, just about mid day Saturday. Groundhog day

Tottenham

Bulgaria

Cowboy

Simple. Massive Celtic victory. 6 OR 7 goals.

Celtic will be so fired up after their old firm defeat. Hope that County are the ones to take the tanking midweek. Think if it was a draw or tic win at Ibrox county would have been facing a second string. Can see Hooper, Stokes and Bangura getting a couple each, and hopefully they wont be so fired up come the weekend. Worst case scenario - county still in the cup. We know Celtic Park will not be easy, but why not make it hard for them. Solid back four, two defensive mids, three attacking mids, one striker prepared for an almighty kicking, and of course plan b and c in the back pocket Who ever gets the attacking role will need to hold the ball up, get wide and direct. Tics defense will not be confident, El Kadouri looks ropey, Mulgrew banned, Rogne and Loovens not very good, and Majstorovic a liability. Wilson is the only reliable

Any one know for sure if our curse has struck again. Have been told that Andrew " Chubbs " Greig has dislocated his shoulder and will be out for 3 months!

With our injuries, lets be honest, if we can stay in touch we will be ok when our injuries clear up. We really need to work on our defending though. It would be good to play both halves well in the same games

class

The better days of Scottish football were largely prior to the onset of computer games and most modern technology. Kids would go out in all weather kicking a ball, come rain or shine, snow and frost. That has now disappeared. The kids who do still go out in all weather, will be the ones we are watching in ten years time, difference is, the coaches have ten times less talent to nurture. All weather pitches, covered community pitches, and doses and doses of encouragement will be needed. The game has changed so much in 25 years. Money has changed it. Celtic won the European cup with ALL Scottish players, Rangers, Aberdeen, and Dundee Utd when they were at their best were full of Scots. Italian, Spanish, German, French, Dutch teams were all full of their own players, with only the exceptional few going to play their football in foreign countries. English football was full of the best British and Irish players. In fact I think before the Bosman ruling, very few won the English league without a backbone of Scottish, Welsh or Irish players. Money and Greed has destroyed all of this. The English, Spanish, Italian, and German teams now have the best players in the world, with all other domestic leagues picking up those who are below this level. Where its all gone wrong for Scottish football, is the not so good foreign players in our game, who are keeping out our young talent, preventing them from developing and getting their chance. Our 12 team, and previous 10 team league strangled our game. Teams are so scared of dropping out of the SPL, the managers are unwilling to play our own talented youngsters, in favor of older journeymen with experience. A bigger league would mean room for the safer teams to try and develop the kids, and give them the chance, and in the long run improving our stock and depth of talent. Barca are the big exception to this in modern times, and if we could have some of what they have we should order masses of it, better weather, loads of pitches, and brilliant youth coaches. Some might shout what about Man U, Arsenal etc. Sure they have very very good youth players in depth, but they are both buying them in from all over the place, depriving the smaller teams of their future players ( Celtics Islam Feruz an example ) because they cannot afford to pay a 16 year old ? 2,500 a week. Back to money again. The only way Scottish football will improve without big money is to concentrate on youth development. Expand the league to give managers the security to try things. Get the under 21s or under 23s back, so they get a chance to develop. Play offs and relegation, and access to the leagues from non league to unstagnate things

biblethumper

tube

I actually admired Lennon and his footballing ability, he rarely lost the ball, won more tackles than he should, and was a calming controlling influence, and one of Celtics better players in my opinion. However, this has always been stained by the Juanjo farce. Lennon cheated and he and his team got away with it. The SFA knew he cheated, and still they did nothing after they cleared Juanjo. Last season, he showed his managerial ability, taking Celtic from embaresment on the field to a very very good team. However he was caught believing the conspiracy theories that all non old firm fans know are bull, but suffered unbelievable levels of shocking behaviour towards him. This season he has been a changed man so far, not spouting the bile that others have made him believe. But then he goes and spoils it all again by lying in his book. I was there, I saw the incident, I know Juanjo didn't touch him. And yet when a fellow countryman ( Lafferty ) copies his move, he would call foul. Cant stand cheats, worse still cant stand cheat who lie, and then continue to lie after cameras prove he lied. Admit the truth that you cheated

Antique

Galore

Spoke to one of the Forres players today, about the final. They are expecting to beat the U19s. Could be a good game

Had to laugh tonight listening to the radio. I think it was Sportsound , and they were talking about Celtic getting back into Europe because of Sion playing several unregistered players. Tam Cowan says he looked at that for complaining to UEFA after the Czech game, but suddenly it dawned on him that thinking it couldnt get worse for the Scottish game, he realised that it wasnt the Czechs that played with players who weren't born in their own country.

We may have another minnow to trip us up soon. Sepp Blatter, FIFA , EUFA and CONCOCAF were in Greenland the week before I was up there on holiday discussing their admission to the world family of football. They have seemingly been prevented from competing by the lack of a grass pitch. Well with global warming and all that, they were up inspecting the standard of a grass football pitch which the Greenland FA have been growing in one of their most southerly cities ( Qaqortoq if i remember ) They are mad passionate about football, and have a number of players who can represent them playing in Danish football. Jesper Groenkjer ex Chelsea was their best known player, but had to play for Denmark as would any other up until now. FIFA have to decide if they compete in North America or Europe seemingly. If they are admitted to UEFA that would just leave one group with the lesser amount of games, and I have heard their is a possibility of one other new nation competing ( think it was going to be Herzogovinia, becoming seperate from Bosnia )