Virgil van Dijk

That is a reasonable post and I dont like to nit pick but at the start you were talking about cutting costs to allow growth. This might be the case with corporations or whatever but we are are football team.

If we cut costs we are limiting the kind of players that can sign for us. All we have seen in the last 10 years is downsizing. I get it though we had debt and we are trying to shed it.

The problem with cutting costs is that we are constantly butchering our first team. Players sold and not replaced. Players not signed that should be signed etc. All this results in the team getting weaker.

Lennons team that got to the last 16 a few years back should have been the team to build on but now with the downsizing I cant see us having a team that will equal that team in the next 3 years. And if we do that team will be butchered and sold off like a cheap * as well.

As long as we keep selling our best players and replacing them with inferior players our future will consist of being in transition and failure to qualify for Europe.

My worst fear is happening right before my eyes. We are blowing the ultimate chance to leave the rest of Scotland behind by not showing the balls required to become CL regulars rather than CL happy to be there men. The policy of playing it safe is actually the policy that is hurting us the most. We need quality not constant transition.

 

I don't think we'll make the same mistakes in terms of signings, like Boerrigter etc. Not entirely sure downsizing is a bad thing when you look at the wage bill.

The core group is still intact, minus two defenders.

The team we have just now is not competing against Neil Lennon's team. Lenny built a good team, then blew all the cash on a few dodgy deals. So in that way we acquired new players at higher cost to no real upsurge in quality either at home or in Europe.

So the bills go up and up and up.

We failed to qualify for the Champions' League, but we weren't really far away from qualifying. It came down to one goal.

The UEFA games were still helpful in developing the team, with two good cheap signings in January we could have went through against Inter Milan. Who knows where that might have taken us. Truth is though we fell short with some dodgy defending.

Downsizing isn't a direct plan to make the team under perform. It makes space for a number of players to come in.

Also failing to qualify for Champions' League once, doesn't mean this pattern is sure to continue. Also the core of the team Lennon put together are still here, it's pretty much still Lennon's team with the additions of Denayer, GMS and Armstrong.

GMS and Armstrong are the only two signings Ronny has made.

So downsizing is to do with the amount of players in the squad and the wage bill, which would be a lot lower if you took out all the players who can't get a game.

I wouldn't interpret that as the quality in the starting eleven deteriorating to a point where we can't compete. Just the same as Van Dijk being sold for a seven figure fee is hardly a cheap fee.

 

The cash wasn't blown under Neil Lennon btw, we bought Van Dijk and Bitton that season. They'll go for near enough £20m between them when they both eventually leave IMO.

 

Ok a couple of things.

It didnt really come down to one goal in Europe. You have to take the Legia result into account. But forget about that for now because I doubt we will ever get our * handed to us like that again in the qualifiers. I am certain Ronny will have learned lessons from it. Thats not to say we cant get beat in these games if we are not strong in enough in the future.

Lennon did not blow the cash on dodgy deals. If you believe that then you are an idiot. The accounts for that window show investment in football personnel at 5.5m. So if you believe that Lennon blew all the Wanyama money, the CL money, Hooper etc on these then you really need to wake up.

In fact we paid nearly double the amount you mention in that window on exceptional expenses which came to 10 million. I suspect this was the Celtic Way but have yet to find out what this 10m was spent on yet.

I was the biggest advocate of our buy low sell high strategy when Lennon rebuilt our whole squad with the money made from the sale of McGeady. I thought when the likes of Victor was sold then we could start doing the same by selling for big money so that we could spend every penny on a higher caliber of player. This has not happened we are still targeting the same players and not every penny is being reinvested. Infact it has become the norm for us to have a negative net spend.

When we were reaching the last 16 of the CL, with a good young squad and coaching team, I thought all it will take now to consolidate this team will be a few quality signings and new long term contracts for our best players. This didnt happen. The team was gutted and we started again.

No harm done i thought Karagandy was a wake up call, never again. Yet Lennon wanted real money that he deserved to rebuild his squad, never got it and walked. We ended up with an inexperienced manager and had to start again.

Instead of building and consolidating we constantly find ourselves atarting again. We should be stronger and better now but we are not. I am hopeful that Ronny can move us up a level but to be honest I am not holding my bredth when they wont fork out low amounts of money for proven talent.

 

Possibly. I don't think loss of judgment comes with age, though. I'm just not as into football. I used to be obsessed with it. I constantly taped games and paused them, asking myself why a certain player did that or why another player chose to position himself in that place. Now it just doesn't interest me very much.

When Virgil leaves, I'll wish him well and always have a soft spot for him; but I won't be interested enough to follow his career in England in any kind of detail. I still miss Big Vic, I catch myself humming his song sometimes; yet I had no idea he'd been injured.

I think the key word here, daft though it might seem, is love: what you love you pay attention to. I used to love football, now I just love Celtic. All you have to do is get Pedro to sign Hummels and I'll soon realise what a good player he is. :icon_mrgreen:

 

OG i didn't mean Lenny blew all the cash that we brought in for transfers. He spent the money he was given on players for one transfer window. £5.5million in Scottish terms is a lot of cash. There were other deals like Bangura that were equally as dodgy. When you add on wages that's more than £5.5million.

This idea that you sell a player for £10million and the manager gets all the money to spend on transfer fees doesn't fit in with the policy of the club. Whether good or bad, that's just the way it is. Makes it even more important to be 100% certain we're getting the right players.

 

Can you explain the benefit of selling a 10m player and only giving the manager half to reinvest and can you explain where the other half gos and can you explain why you think this is acceptable?

Defending a negative net spend is mental we take enough turnover in to have a positive net spend every season, which was the norm until recently.

 

A negative net spend on transfer fees is not the same as a negative net spend on the playing squad. There are any number of things we might want to invest our money in (wages, training facilities, youth system, stadium, etc) that could, in principle, justify a negative net spend on transfer fees.

 

Completely understand what you are getting at, but we have also been offloading the higher earners in recent years as well. Samaras, Forster & Ledley for example.

 

True. Well, I don't know what the plan is. The thing is, though, that (however much I don't like certain things like their treatment of the GB and their stance on political songs) I trust Pedro and DD to know a lot more about developing a business than the vast majority of MD's and chairmen at British clubs (and certainly far more than I ever will understand). The choice on where to invest our money will in part depend on what opportunities are there and Lawwell has said they are willing to invest decent money on a player if the right investment opportunity shows up.

I'd love to see us take our model to the next level like Porto or Benfica but apparently it will take some time to get there. The reputation we are now getting by developing players like Vic, Lurch, Virgil and (possibly) Bitton is going to really help us with this in the longer term.

 

I do think that, for whatever reason, Lenny wasn't backed enough for my liking, though, I must admit. I understand why he walked.

 

Mark Guidi, not for the first time, last night was talking about 8 million for Vvd and the likes of Brentford coming in for him. Mega downplaying Virgil. Even arguing with callers bringing up Hutton being bought by a top 6 club for 9 mill, when he couldn't lace Virgil's boots. And I rated, rate, Hutton but that was obscene money for him and ability and potential wise, they are scarily worlds apart..

 

The way some people (not you) go on about high earners leaving you would think the current players don't get a wage.

We have brought in enough players since the big earners left to spend the money saved.


The accounts do not lie,we are not sat will 50 million in the bank and its clear the club is using some of the player sales money to do other things when needed.

 

I think this has been part of the problem. We have brought in too many players. We have went for quantity rather than quality. We spunked millions away on Pukki & Balde, when really, we only needed one striker. someone to replace Hooper. We should have been using the transfer fees and wages we spent on both, to bring in one quality striker.

 

Yep. No one is expecting 5/6/7 mill signings but we've stocked up on dross over the last year and a half or so and panic bought/loaned are way through dud after dud..

Ronny has mentioned he won't necessarily go down the loan route again, unless a wonder appears (a denayer). I fully expect to not see tonev/Wakaso/Berget has gone/Pukki/Balde/Fridge/ and then the possible scepovic/Rogic and I might have missed one or two but but that is enough alone, then we have guys like guidetti kicking about doing fuckall now..

I fully trust in Ronny to pull a couple rabbits out the hat this summer and bring the squad right down. He has already said that as well..

 

But the price of those players is not the problem,the problem is the scouts and manager got it wrong.
Not all players will be a wanyama or vvd or ledely but we do have to reduce the amount of failed signings coming through the club.
Part of the problem may be the fans wanting a player signed every window and the club panic buying sometimes when some targets fall through.

Lets hope ronny is better at spotting a player than lenny was.

 

That would be a shame,i think the loan route is great for the club and would cut out the duds on long term contracts.

 

It certainly can be, denayer and more so, Forster, are good examples of what we can do for your career, as well as Celtic getting something back in some way..

I'm unsure, actually I'm sure Ronny wouldn't have gone down the loan route if he was in and settled, or trusted with a decent transfer kitty. I don't think we would have signed wakaso/Tonev or even his old player berget, if it wasn't panicking. Do you think the likes of guidetti and tonev the *, have been good for morale in the team? I'd say not..
Special cases like denayer, all day long, but Ronny signed Johansen and denayer early, and wasn't scared to snap up domestic talent for a pittance in Armstrong and gms that has worked out a mill each, steal. I trust Ronny can spot a talent

 

It was £20m in transfers that season, £12m for wanyama, £5.5m for Hooper and £2.5m for Kelvin Wilson.

£5.5m back into the squad when you've taken out the spine of the team, just off the back of a cash rich last 16 Champions League campaign is not good enough and it showed in the Champions League that season.

 

I couldn't understand the thinking behind the signing of Pukki. He wasn't a prolific goalscorer, and we were trying to replace Gary Hooper, or we certainly should have been, who was a prolific goalscorer for us. I still think the money used on Balde & Pukki should have been used to bring in one quality striker. I know it's easy to say in hindsight, but we didn't need to go bringing in two. It was just someone to replace Hooper that was required, which we still haven't been able to do.