The board

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Apparently 10-20% of shares are unaccounted for. Read that recently. Desmond has his proxies within the board taking him to around 54% of the shares.

We as a fanbase are powerless to stop or change anything. Dementia or death will get him before he sells.

The other options are criminal as to single any board member out. As I said. We're absolutely powerless.

More chance.of more fencing and barriers being in for the next game than the signings needed.

A purposely manged decline. The question is why??

 

The chat of boycotts and stuff would be totally ineffective imo. There are folk on the waiting list for a season book for 5+ years if folk gave them up other folk would gladly snap them up. The Europa boycott already loses weight when you consider we have 40,000 plus on the home cup scheme and even if there was a boycott and they had to close some sections they would have justification for the 'rainy day fund'

 

From Craig on the CeltsAreHere Substack


Some defeats bruise. Others scar. Then there are nights like this — Celtic tumbling out of the Champions League to the champions of Kazakhstan — that expose everything rotten at the heart of the club. Not a freak slip-up, not a banana skin. A humiliation that strips bare the delusion that Celtic are still on a path towards Europe’s elite. Maribor, Malmö, AEK Athens, CFR Cluj, Ferencváros, FC Midtjylland and now Kairat Almaty.
For years the board have sold supporters the fantasy of Celtic as a “Champions League club.” The reality? A waxwork version of itself: recognisable in outline, hollow in substance. Not long ago, Celtic went to Munich and gave Bayern a fright. Now Yang is starting European ties despite being pushed toward the exit door weeks earlier, only to be spared because no replacement was signed in time. What should have been a squad refreshed with investment has instead been slowly hollowed out, brittle and fragile. This wasn’t just a bad night at the office. It was the inevitable consequence of neglect. It’s a brutal pattern: the last five times Celtic have been tasked with the Champions League qualifiers, they’ve fallen at the hurdle.


Brendan Rodgers is not blameless. His football has turned stale, selections timid, and his team toothless. Even his harshest critics, though, would concede he’s been hung out to dry. He asked for reinforcements in January. He asked again in the summer. He got platitudes. Rodgers has become what the board wanted him to be: a human shield. A lightning rod for the fury while those above him count coins in comfort.
And so to the directors, where the rot lies. Some people save for a rainy day. Celtic’s board filled a jar with their own *, launched it skyward, and acted surprised when it came back down on their heads. Waiting until after qualifiers to buy players wasn’t prudence. It was negligence dressed as strategy. They gambled on banking £40–50 million in Champions League money before spending a penny. Instead, they torched it. A fortune lost not to accident, but to arrogance.
Defenders of the board will point to the gleaming balance sheet, but you cannot hang banners made of profit margins. They will talk about domestic dominance, but winning in Scotland is the bare minimum for a club of Celtic’s size. And they will haul out 2012 — the spectre of Rangers’ implosion — as if that justifies paralysis. It is an utterly daft, narrow-minded and disingenuous argument, deployed only to shout down those who dare ask Celtic to be the best they can be. Nobody is demanding recklessness. What’s being asked for is competence: timely signings, long-term planning, and giving the manager the tools to compete. What once passed for stability has long since curdled into regression.






Because for this board, ambition ends where Ibrox begins. They believe they’ve done their job if Celtic finish a point ahead of Rangers. *, even a goal. European humiliation can be brushed off, millions can be squandered, and reputations trashed — so long as the league flag is draped across the directors’ box come May. That’s the level of vision on offer: a club reduced to measuring itself only against its neighbour, while the rest of the continent pulls further and further away.
Look elsewhere and the shame deepens. Clubs with a fraction of Celtic’s wealth and support are daring to dream and punching holes in Europe’s elite. Dinamo Zagreb, Young Boys, Ludogorets, Bodo/Glimt. They take risks, they build, and they reap the rewards. Meanwhile, Celtic shrink, convinced that staying one nose in front of Rangers is an acceptable ceiling. It is cowardice disguised as strategy.



And towering over it all is Dermot Desmond. The majority shareholder, the absent landlord, the man who sneers whenever the word is used. He treats Celtic like a toddler treats a toy — dazzled by it once, then bored and leaving it to gather dust in the corner. He won’t let anyone else play with it, yet only drifts back now and then to shuffle the pieces and remind everyone it’s still his. This isn’t stewardship. It’s vanity. And until Desmond steps aside, Celtic will remain trapped. The truth is simple: Celtic is not his toy to neglect.
Celtic are a great footballing institution, but right now they’re living a lie. The board hides behind balance sheets, the manager hides behind excuses, and the players hide behind tired patterns of play. Glasgow rivalry cannot be the limit of their ambition. Until that changes, until Europe becomes more than a footnote, Celtic will remain prisoners of their own small-minded triumphalism. The fans deserve Europe. The fans deserve ambition. But they’re fed only the same old line.

 

Huns selling their wantaway striker and already got a fee agreed for miovski highlights just how incompetent we are.

For what it’s worth Miovski would walk into our team just now so we should be matching whatever the Huns have offered but instead we’ll be scratching around the bargain bucket trying to fleece some European club for some unkown * hoping they somehow turn into a £15m player.

 

Wonder if we'll get a statement. Honestly the most predictable failure.

 

I said it the other day we should make an offer for him that he won’t refuse,think he’d rather be at Celtic just don’t lowball the guy.Let’s make a move better than what sevco are making and get him in the door.

 

Lucky * * that we don't play at CP for 3 weeks.

 

Nothing will happen and nothing will change. Desmond has his puppets in place doing his bidding for him. The one time we dared stray away from that was Dom McKay who lasted a grand total of 3 months

 

All these bids that go in less than £3m backs up the theory anything above that Desmond has to authorise!!!

 

A lot of that 70% is owned by consortiums or hedge funds, etc who just see us as a sure bet for their investors. They have no material interest in the football operations of the club, as long as the organisation is stable and turning a profit.

 

I think there are definitely some players who want to look at options and hold out, same with clubs. I can also understand the club wanting to see the European competition before spending everything. But I don't see why we couldn't have had some of these players in a few weeks ago, even if it cost £250k extra per player.

 

Did i just read that a report is claiming we are "reigning in spending" and axed two deals because of Rodgers CL embarrassment????



Aww well. Looks the party days of 2-3m pound punts and pointless loans in late August are over bhoys and ghirls.

We need to tighten our belts apparently.

We'll be fine Im sure. The club have a list of leisure centre 5-a-side stars who only need to cut out the swally after a 15 minute jaunt around the astro turf to get up to speed. Then theyll slot right in.

Here we go! 10 in a row!

 

Great article but ive seen it before after many other qualifying failures.

We all know who and what the problem is. We need ideas and solutions on how to rid this club of the cancer that is Desmond.

 

Desmond is tinpot. Cant even get one of the biggest clubs in Europe into the Champions League with an easy draw. Tinpot Desmond.

 

Plenty time to get the banners made though.

 

* HH

 

Lol as a result of how * we were last night i shall be only doing small hh today rather than my usual big HH as a mark of respect for the death of our CL ambitions lol.hh