Controversial Celtic Opinions

I come for the Celtic chat but I stay for the outstanding analysis of Abba songs.
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I don’t know the best way to say what I mean here but in my opinion a large section of the Celtic support get far too emotional about it all.

We need to grow up and stop trying to force everything to be poetic, like Lenny and Broony here for the 10. It’s just stupid and cringey.

 

Not sure I agree with that one.

Before Griffiths latest shitstorm, there was a fair number here wanting to give him a new contract while also keen to see us accept just about any offer for Edouard.

One literally arrived into pre-season too far to even try and get into shape, the other has a languid playing style that means he often looks disinterested, but is regularly available for selection and finished our top scorer. Reckon the Scottish guys get cut a lot of slack sometimes.

 

A controversial opinion formed on the back of some of the opinions in this thread….

The football under MON was underrated. There was much more clearly distinct tactical variation in football in the O’Neill era than there is in the current ‘post-Barcelona’ era of press and counter-press. Judging O’Neill’s football in terms of what’s desirable in the modern era doesn’t fit right for me.

It wasn’t a possession based team. We would look to go direct and then build up in the final third, or get the ball wide, beat players, and get a cross in. Obviously set pieces were also a very strong point. We could go toe-to-toe with the best sides on the planet and hurt them every time we went forward, and I find that aspect alone more exciting than pretty much any football I’ve seen us play in the post MON era, with the exception of Rodgers first season.

On MON more broadly, he can be underated as a manager by our support. Yes, he’s a bit of a dinosaur now, but he was a very high calibre manager at one stage. Again, judging him by modern standards, and the requirements of a modern manager, seems a bit unfair.

 

Excellent post..

It was massively underrated. I still think it was better than anything we've had since..

Obviously we had much better player's and a world class striker but anyone who doesn't think we could play, go and watch us away at Ajax when we pumped them 3-1. We were a side who couple build it up through midfield, had a massive threat on both wing's and could go route one if needed with the likes of Stan breaking beyond..

Juve away watch the way we dominated them after going behind and were cheated last minute..

He was an excellent manager, respected down here and up there as a major coup at the time and rightly so..

Loved his passion and wouldn't take no * with the media, who were feart of him due to his background..

 

I agree with this totally, I think too often MON’s teams were dismissed as being solely reliant on physical dominance which was not the case. It certainly was an aspect to the way the team played and made us a threat against anyone but we were also capable of holding our own against anyone in the CL we came up against.

I think the issue with comparing MON to now is he was very much a manager, great motivator and had excellent coaches in John Robertson, Steve Walford and I am sure others support him (hence the importance of a backroom team). Most top guys now are not managers they are head coaches.

Being honest you could probably label the same at Alex Ferguson (obviously achieved a higher level than MON) but was a very similar approach, where he managed whilst others took the coaching on.

 

Apart from set pieces Turnbull was mostly average last season.

 

Good point about the way the managerial role has changed.

Ferguson’s Utd team are actually the one that stands out to me as being most similar to MON’s Celtic team, stylistically. Both teams had a strong physical presence, strong personalities, and could play. Neither adopted a style that would be deemed attractive by modern standards - but very few teams did at the time. Attractive football then was seen as attacking football, beating players, whipping in crosses, even being physically dominant, whereas now it all seems to be based on adopting a similar approach to the great Barca side under Pep - intricate passing movements and an exhausting press.

 

He was the only player that had the ability to take the ball and drag the team up the park by going past a few men. He was too heavily relied upon I felt. Your Robson, Brown, Hartley were all good at doing the dirty work, but none were ball carriers. Nakamura was capable of moments of magic, more than just a few moments it should be said, but couldn't really carry the ball and get us up the park. I take your point about it being more of a team effort, but for me, the onus was on McGeady more so than anyone else to perform. He was also far more heavily criticised when things didn't come off for him compared to others.

 

Best one for this was at Rugby Park when we won the league under Lennon, when we had 3 out of 4 stands

 

He's got room for improvement but it's very harsh to judge a guy that walked into that struggling side with players barely trying beside him.

If we get the recruitment right and he's playing behind a striker who gives a *, I think we'll see him go up a level again this season.

 

I remember a CL qualifier we were in 111 with the GB before it was standing, Wanyama scored the winner I’m sure. Was electric that night. Best atmosphere I’ve ever experienced.

 

Possibly Helsingborg. We won 2-0. Wanyama got the 2nd and Hooper got the 1st I'm sure.

 

The band that sing some of the songs on Celtic TV are brutal.

 

I'm Probably being harsh but I think he was overrated a lot of the time because we had * all else to be excited about.
Thought decent corners and free kicks masked a lot of average performances.

 

Yeah, spot on: Helsingborg game. Pretty sure it was 2012, the year of *that* Barca win.

I was in 411, the section directly above, for both those games. Amazing atmosphere in that whole corner that season. Wasn’t just the GB.

 

Amazed at that as we normally have similar views on games normally.

Some of his vision and flicks to take out the defence are sublime. I thought he stood out like a sore thumb in what was arguably the poorest performing Celtic side in more than a decade. So composed even under pressure, never just skelps a ball.

Put him in beside quality & wingers/FBs running other side and I'm sure he'll win you over.

 

Soro is massively over rated