Brendan Rodgers Discussion Thread

The game was stretched as * and players were *.

The only slight change was he appeared to ask Ralston to push on further to give a bit of width as Nygren was playing narrow.

Still only had 1 upfront and Maeda was out on touchline.

 

That's my take, but did think you meant something else. Thanks for clarifying.

 

I genuinely wouldn’t blame him for walking, we have been poor for a while but the quality of player he’s having to deal with while we are the richest we have ever been is actually * mind boggling.

 

Same as his last spell here. Majority of success was build on Deilas squad plus Sinclair and Dembele while rest of his signings sat on the bench.

He gets an easy out by making out he's not overly involved in signings but the trend that's followed him through his career of wasting * tons of money on squad players suggests otherwise.

 

I don’t think it is either but i also don’t think it’s entirely unexpected that we haven’t been able to beat them when we are so short in forward areas, which to me is next to no fault of the manager. Almaty were absolutely dreadful, but they were incredibly well organised and very, very defensive. It’s no shock to me that we were unable to break them down given just how * we are up front.

Poor results last season should’ve been used as a warning sign that we needed to strengthen and the squad was going stale and needed freshened. It wasn’t. Instead we’ve sold important players and not replaced them.

Yang and Forrest will get stick but the reality is we shouldn’t be in a position where they’re the best options we have available. That’s not their fault and it’s not the managers either because no one can tell me he’s happy with having them two as his first picks.

Idah was just a poor signing imo, was never good enough to begin with and never likely to be good enough. But overpaying on him to the tune we did wasn’t on Rodgers. Engels I still think could be good, again another we just massively overpaid on, again due to the incompetence of those who are in charge of getting the deals over the line. Trusty has been harshly treated by Rodgers in my opinion and agreed Bernardo hasn’t really kicked on, but at £5m I don’t really think that’s a disastrous amount of money for us, and we could recoup pretty much all of that if we sold him.

I don’t think Rodgers is without his faults, the reality is no manager we could ever hope to attract will be, but no one could say he’s being provided with the tools he needs to make Celtic as good as it can be.

 

The same board have had plenty other managers woefully unprepared for CL qualifies. I’m assuming it was Deila and Lennon’s fault for not signing players fast enough also?

 

We’re just about to sign a winger we’ve been linked with for 13 * months. Who’s * fault is that?

 

5 strikers are you kidding me? How many minutes of football have those 5 strikers seen in a Celtic shirt? How many of them have experience of playing at this level? We didn't replace Kyogo and thats a fact. Signing cheap projects and youth players isn't replacing our most experienced striker and an out and out goal scorer. So you can wrap that point up and stick it up your * as its utter garbage.

I don't care how much Almaty spent this summer. We've spent £3M and brought in over £22M. We haven't replaced players we've sold and left ourselves short in several positions.

Say what you want about style but we created chances and shout have scored. In both legs. Daizen should have buried that 1 on 1 with the keeper. We were beaten by a team that didn't have a single shot on target across the 2 legs.

Blame Brendan all you like, you handcuff any manager, downgrade your squad and sell your best players without replacement and you ask for trouble. Tonight in a round about way was justice for our abysmal summer window.

 

Maeda playing up front wasn't really a shock tonight though in fact I would argue most (myself included) would have had it as the favoured option. We don't have 1 adequate striker and are forced to play a winger there and folk are moning he never played 2 strikers.

Shin has been pretty anonymous in the limited game time he's had
We set our asking price at 1m for Kenny when Bolton bid ... then a week later gave him an extension
Idah seemingly was struggling for fitness and has been a carthorse for months
Osmond has a grand total of 0 senior apps

You can add other positions as well to highlight the failings Ralston at RB, Scales at CB nevermind LB

I just can't help but feel the anger and calling for Rodgers to be sacked is misplaced anger. A new manager comes in tomorrow and faces the exact same problems. Rodgers with backing showed last year what he can do this summer he simply hasn't been backed and as it stands it seems we're getting a guy on loan from Boca and signing a boy we've been linked with for over a year.

 

OK - but not sure how this relates to I the points I'm making? How others badly manage a situation just strengthens my point surely?

 

Rodgers and the Board?

 

Even though the board have screwed him big-time I do think Rodgers needs to look at some of his own failings too. That said, were he to leave, I shudder to think who we'd end up with as coach given the people who run this club. All you could say for certain is that it would be a downgrade.

 

Ange had to start Barkas, Ralston, Welsh, Bitton, Soro and Turnbull against Midtjylland. Must have been his own fault though for not getting players in fast enough. Poor from him to be honest. Not the boards fault, they try their best.

 

Why is it Rodgers fault do you think?

 

Longing for the day we find a manager that players actually want to play for. Rodgers has had his redemption arc and has that in the bank. Anyone holding it against him for leaving last time is guilty of holding a childish grudge.

But to get us playing so we'll up to a point last season, to losing it so drastically and quickly around the turn of the year, it's blatantly obvious that he is the problem. Whatever recruitment issues there are....we have some excellent players who are proven quality, who now struggle to put 2 or 3 good performances together.

He's supposed to be a good coach who improves players but has done the exact opposite, to the point folk can't wait to get out the door or are unable to play at their best.

He's absolutely done I'm afraid. Time to go.

 

Yeah of course it comes down to lack of spending this summer and your 100% right on that but with 15 minutes to go i don't think it would have hurt to get an extra striker on the pitch.

Ok I'll concede Osmand but the other 4 should be good enough to play against Kairat Almaty.

Idah is a £9m international striker who scored 20 goals last season
Maeda is last year's player of the year and scored 33 goals
Shin was top goalscorer in a higher league than Kazakhstan league
Kenny has had a good preseason, scored at the weekend and scored goals in Europe last year against better opposition than Almaty.

Are they the level we should have? No probably not but they are more than enough to get past a team from Kazakhstan over 2 legs