Brendan Rodgers Discussion Thread

I do agree with alot of what you're saying there. My main objection to the post I quoted was the terminology used that implied Brendan might be deliberately downing tools and looking to "slither" out the club. There is no denying that some of our football, performances and results have left alot to be desired at times. I'm just not sure poor management from Brendan is the biggest contributing factor to that.

The Rangers results are particularly annoying and every game their plan is to nullify Calmac. So I do agree that he can and should do more to counter that. I do still feel that when theres something properly on the line we generally find a way to beat them though.

I've said this previously on other threads but the Kairat result for me is a direct result of the shambolic window. We didn't even do the bare minimum to prepare for that game. We all knew performances had dipped a bit towards the end of last season and we needed some reinforcements. On top of that we sold Kuhn. It also transpires that we had a few players heavily involved looking for a move away too. So I feel if we'd properly prepared for the game and signed fresh faces at the right time we'd have gotten through comfortably. Add that to the fact that even by the end of the window we still didn't add the required quality then I find it very hard to blame Brendan for it. He played about as strong an XI over both of those games and we couldn't get the job done.

I do also struggle to think of many managers at big clubs that change their formations regularly. I do agree given the personnel we have at the club we could play a different formation but generally most big teams I can think of play a very similar system every week. And I think if you look at least season as a whole it was a very successful season, so again I can't really point at Brendan and say he failed us in that regard.

We are abysmal at set pieces of any kind. Totally agree with you there. Toothless in attack and alot of teams have had success against us from set pieces too. Massive room for improvement there. Do we have a set piece coach at the club? Genuine question as I'm honestly not sure. If not we should definitely look at one.

This season is definitely a massive test. For me, its by far the worst squad Brendan has had at his disposal. I struggle to see where the goals in our team are coming from. If Brendan can guide us to January still top of the league and not get humiliated in the Europa then he's doing a brilliant job. But you are right he will have to adapt and really coach the best out of who is here in order to do it. However I have massive concerns about the quality and depth of this squad and feel like any manager would struggle with it, especially in Europe. Again though, if he and the team fail this season, the bulk of the blame still doesn't lie at his door for me. Regardless if he walks at the end of the season or before, we have a massive job of getting that squad in the shape it should be in.

 

Since he returned, we won the league both seasons against nearest opposition that have had no shortage of self inflicted issues of their own, while largely reliant on a team that was inherited, as most of the additions that have come in during his tenure have not exactly set the heather ablaze. But there is nothign new in that, as he has a pretty dismal track history in the transfer market, irrespective of club or budget. He also tweaked team tactics that did help in last season's CL no doubt, but on the other hand has not always been about getting the most out of those he had at his disposal. Kyogo's strength was always his pace and ability to make runs in behind the opposition defenders, BR had him coming back into MF. While that is in the past, its symptomatic the effect it has had on those playing at CF, even though goals have continued to come from all quarters... but goals from all over the pitch was true under Ange also.

The tactical changes he did make have essentially been the same now for 2 straight seasons and the way this season has started, seem to be more of the exact same, withouth change to formation or tweaking. Which has made it increasingly easy for teams to devise ways to contend with Celtic as a result. And for £3m p.a. to not be able to come up with fresh ideas or be able to coach a Plan B to players to change things up, apart from making like for like substitutes.

The cloak of invincibility in the Cups has slipped to the lottery of spotkicks now. 0 wins in the past 5 games v Sevco. The rhetoric leading into all of those games has been some variation of the same "preparing for it like we would any other game', and whether that is true or not, it is not working, because it is not just the scoreline, it's the lacklustre performances against a team that has no shortage of their own self inflicted issues.

Last season, no question started off great guns all firing on all cylinders (Im not a car person, but I think that is the expression), but since the turn of the year has garnered just 2 points more than Hibs and Sevco.

BR long had a reputation for being able to improve players to become better. it's debateable if this has been the case since his return, and if so, with regards to who? When Kuhn first came in there was questions about his fitness and strength, something that he clearly worked on in summer 2024, so that he absolutely hit the ground running last season. But an individual player improving fitness and strength is not exactly a masterstroke of coaching prowess. Matt O'Riley was already well on his way to becoming a player in the 18 months spent under Ange also.

Or coaching the team as a whole. Set pieces are the one thing that 100% can be practiced on the training pitch. 34% of all goals at the last 7 WC's have come from set pieces (corners, FKs and penalties - not including penaltie shootouts, just to clarify). That is how valuable set pieces can be and the importance of practicing them. Since Jan 6 (when Trusty scored) til now, there have been 288 corners taken for a grand total of 1 goal. Roughly teams average a goal every 30 corners and approx 3% of all goals come from corner kicks. Celtic under Rodgers operates at about 0.3%.

Identifying what other teams are doing and being able to come up with a new idea or two how to contend with thiat, how to change it up, or make in-game changes, apart from substitutions seems to be something he is completely anathema to. That is fine when everything is going well, but we have seen Celtic compete in games, other side changes things up and the Bhoys are left trying to do the same thing to diminishing, if not nullified effectiveness.

While I am, we are all sympathetic of the situation concerning how the transfer window and not just the recruitment, but how it was conducted as well as the timing, but that does not mean he is entitled to a free pass for things that he deserves to be held accountable for. He is being paid a lot of money as an elite manager, far more than any other manager, not only in the history of the club but in all of Scottish football history, so the least that should be expected is that to be held accountable for the things that he is responsible for.

 

@Champions67 The timing of the recruitment is one of the biggest issues I have with regards to how the summer window unfolded, and not for the first time. So, we are in total agreement there.

However, the points I made still stand about the Kairat games, especially in Glasgow, still stand. He does bare resposibility for that every bit as much as the club executives, such as Nicholson, for not doing his job properly. Kairat manager did his homework, studied what other teams have done to nullify Celtic, and they got the result they wanted. In fact, had it not been for a marginal offside, it could've been even worse, as Kairat were the only team to put the ball in the net in either leg, so VAR saved a few blushes there.

Celtic went out to do the exact same thing as always and I doubt more than a lip service was paid to studying up on Kairat, a team who had already knocked out the champions of Slovenia, Finland and Slovakia, and rated some 250-odd places lower than Celtic in UEFA rankings (such as they are), and who literally set up exactly how St M had just a few weeks prior, and that BR could not identify that or was too obstinate to change anything apart from players and hoping something would happen. Again, when you know exactly how a team is going to play makes it a lot easier to plan for how to cope with that.

Again, preparation, or in this case, making better use of set pieces as something to fall back on. 34% over 7 WC's back this up. It is not a fluke. Those numbers exist for a reason. Teams can practice them. There are always games when things just aren't clicking and the ability to do something from a set piece can totally be the difference. 15 corners in that game that Celtic had. May as well been 0.

Oh, and even from open play in the first leg, Kairat had a better xG than Celtic.

Considering going to Kazakhstan (where no Scottish team, club, NT or U/21 have ever won) in the return leg would require 7000mile round trip, being played in heat and at altitude on a dreadful pitch against a team who took the weekend off between games to prepare also. All of this is all the more reason why that first game was critical.

We have seen teams change things up against Celtic. From world class sides like Atletico Madrid to those on more of a similar level, including Feyenoord or Club Bruges have managed it, and left the Hoops punching at shadows. Or as you point out, Sevco man-marking Calmac and surely he must see what everyone else is, but does nothing to change it up. Get CalMac playing further forward and try Hatate in the more defensive CM spot, see if the markers stick with CalMac or its a positional thing and mark Hatate. Either way, you learn something and can thing change things again based on that, whihc is better than doing nothing.

So, yes, we totally agree that the timing of doing transfer business undoubtedly didn't help, BR still had a team there to prepare and for whatever reason, maybe just assumed that the team would go out and it would be a cakewalk, and between that or not doing something different either on th enight or over the summer and in pre-season, he absoutely has to be held accountable for that also, every bit as much as Nicholson does.

 

He's doing his 3yrs, its his legacy..

He will do it in spite of the board.

 

Maybe there's a world where we go deep in Europa, he wins the league, we have real change at board level and he signs a new deal.

He is elite and we will absolutely miss him. It's absolutely embarrassing the way a manager of his level has been treated.

 

In all honesty even in this utter shambles I still expect us to win the league, do well in the cups, probably win one is definitely something we should expect from him, given the competition.

It's doing well in Europe and being an attacking, attractive team and longer term success I'd say this transfer window has sacrificed.

 

And if he does that, my hat off to him and deserves every word of praise, because this is the season where there really is a challenge to test his mettle and would undoubtedly be a bigger achievement than any since the Invincibles - and potentially even greater than that also.

 

Hope your right and Rodgers can pull it off. Given the circumstances for us to win the league this season would be a genuine achievement.

 

Again, I agree with the bulk of what you're saying there. Very well made points. I've spent time debating on the Kairat thread at length about how I felt they were the better team, better prepared and managed to execute their game plan to a tee, so I do get the criticism, and do agree with alot of it. But again I can't see past the transfer window. I think it was far more likely to draw a tougher team than them in the playoff which makes even less sense to me why we were so woefully unprepared going into those games. Its inexcusable. Brendan obviously should be able to do more in the home of course. But that squad for me just really doesn't give him anything close to the best chance of succeeding.

Totally agree that preparation should have been better. Not postponing that game against Livingston made absolutely no sense at the time and proved to be an awful decision. I do agree he does deserve some criticism, as any manager does after some poor results. But I feel the board have let him down big style as I've said and that we're failing to back him. I don't think a different manager gets any more out of this squad than Brendan would. I could be wrong of course but I just don't see it. I think we need massive changes above manager level to give Brendan or whoever else the best possible chance to take us forward.

Lets hope he can guide us to success this season despite all the bullshit of the summer. It will be a massive challenge.

 

The first season was also a test given the squad was an utter shambles due to……..recruitment unsurprisingly. After we signed duds that had clearly been identified well before Rodgers arrived.

 

All eyes on Brendan today with his press conference. He'll have been spoke to to mind his words, but I hope does not do his gushing pish of we are connected again. His bosses have sold him out.

Whilst I'm not expecting a public execution of the board by him, he should remain neutral as he can. There's bad blood here, he's not staying so should do the best for his players. Don't be a sell out.

 

He'll acknowledge the disappointment of the window, praise the hard work of the current squad and emphasise the need to focus on the games ahead as we can still have a great season.

I wish him luck with anything over and above that, he's up against it big time with this one.

 

Would be the absolute highlight of the season if he called these * out today, but he won’t.

 

If he's trying to engineer his exit like the board seem to think, there is no better way than telling the reporters today exactly what he thinks, get the pay off and leave.

 

He’ll play it smart for his press conference today



Brendan knows how to work the media

 

In my career as a football manager in Football Manager and Championsship manager i always sent my assistant out to do them.

 

No wonder

“Livingston have won 2 out of 12 Premiership fixtures and sit 11th in the table. Surely they have no chance of beating your Celtic team?”

Yawn…

 

Kennedy supposedly taking the conference today

I think that’s the smart decision in fairness