Joe’s Blog - September 1

Wed, 1 Sep 2010 23:01:09 -0500

I have returned fatter, refreshed and with childish glee from the Peoples Republic of Cork. Me and the familia took a short break in the rebel county where I met a guy from Larkhall. I struck up a cagey conversation with the rotund Scot - aware that he could be a hun - and found out pretty quickly that he was one of our own, or so he lead me to believe. After tiring of this guys shite talk and of chasing my 1 year old daughter around the dance floor, I proceeded to get very drunk and ended up taking part in a parents talent contest where I started off every task with a impersonation of the ‘Crane Technique’ from Karate Kid (1984). Don’t ask why, I don’t know! I’d arranged to meet my Larkhall pal for the game on Sunday and he duly showed up and we chatted. It was at this point that he confessed he was more of Hamilton Accies fan than a Celtic fan, but still he cheered every ball. I’d lost all respect for him and when the game finished I made my excuses and ditched his ass. Any grown man that tells you he supports your team because that’s what you want to hear, needs a boot in the stones. But he was a big guy, so someone else can handle that end. Numpty!!

Transfer deadline day is like having erectile disfunction. You put loads of effort into getting excited, but end up completely exhausted and let down by the end. We’ve signed Anthony Stokes from Hibs. The same Anthony Stokes who went salivating with dollar signs in his eyes to Roy Keane’s Sunderland after knocking back Celtic. Low and behold, he pissed Keano off, found himself out of favour and was heading back to Scotland. I’m not saying Stokes is a bad player; far from it. I’m just not overjoyed by his signing. We all had so many high hopes during this transfer window and we didn’t really get what we wanted. No Bellamy, no Keane (although as I write there are hundreds of threads reporting his sighting at Glasgow airport, me thinks it’s crap, but hope it’s not), no Given and now no European football to sooth us when we are jonesing for a game midweek. It’s depressing. But look on the bright side........................................................ummmmm................oh, Izaguirre looks like a good player. See, I told you. Call me Mr Bright Side.

Stokes is in, but he can’t come close to easing the pain of crashing out of Europe when all around thought it was just a matter of getting a goal. One measly goal was all we needed and it never came. The team fell apart and once again had us cursing away performances in Europe. But we can’t dwell on that morbid crap for too long because we have a league to win and win we must. If this Lennon revolution is going to work - and I think it will - we need to concentrate on hammering Rangers in to the ground. That’s the current mission, end of! Forget Europe; onwards and sidewards!!

So, Motherwell was the tonic we had on offer to cure the beastly hangover of Utrecht. The unlikely benching of Juarez and Kayal was a surprise and one would hope not a knee jerk reaction by Lenny for what was a toothless performance in Holland. As usual a tough enough game for the bhoys at Fir Park, with a starting place for Daryl Murphy. Not really sold on Murphy to be honest. He seems to try hard enough but he just looks like he lacks a bit of self belief. I hope I’m totally wrong; it’s just a nagging feeling I get when I look at him. But I’m no Carl Jung. The guy could just look naturally boring for all I know. I was glad to see old rubber wrists Zaluska dumped from starting line up. Yeah we were outplayed by Utrecht, but Zaluska got his hand to both those penalties and still couldn’t keep any out. I’ve got nothing against the guy, but if you can’t do it right, we’ll get somebody else. The game was a bit of slog for me, mainly because I had Hamilton’s most famous non tim filling my ear with question upon question about growing up in Belfast. I wanted to take him out back and knee cap him after about 10 minutes. Nightmare!! The three points were collected and the league campaign is still on solid footing. You can’t fault that. Up next is visit of the diet huns. I always like playing Hearts because they believe they can get a result, and have in the past. It should be an interesting test for the new recruits.

At the beginning of the season we bloggers were all chomping at the bit in anticipation of the wealth of issues we would have to talk about. Europe, big transfer news and non stop mocking of the huns. It’s hasn’t panned out that way so far, but still we plough on and dig deep for the inspiration that fuels the magic. What else can we do, it’s in our nature.

To end I have to give a big congratulations to Chris and Gerry for conducting the interview of interviews. My wife took the kids off for 2 hours on Saturday for a potter around Cork and I poured an afternoon whiskey and listened to the podcast. Brilliant!! Credit to everyone that made it happen, especially Henrik. You really are the King Henke. The Lostbhoys profile has just shot up considerably with that scoop interview as it was the talk of Celtic cyberspace. I’m proud to be associated bhoys, very proud.

Of course, on a side note, the reason the podcast works so well is due entirely to the natural wit and charm that comes from being brought up in Belfast. Chris and I are blessed with lethal powers of persuasion and unfathomable talent the like of which outsiders can only dream of coming close to. It must be hard being from somewhere like............Larkhall. Where there are tims that aren’t tims and Accies fans that cheer on a rival team out of politeness. Well at least he wasn’t a hun.

Hail Hail!!
Joe

Charlie’s Blog - August 30

Mon, 30 Aug 2010 17:39:24 -0500

Alright troops? So its back to the topsy turvy Celtic that we have come to know and, well, is love the right word! Of course we all love Celtic Football Club but I just wish we could show some consistency thats all.

After a couple of great performances at home against Utrecht and St Mirren hopes were high that we could be in for a good run in the Europa League and ease to the SPL title. I sit here today after watching the game in Holland in the week and against Motherwell at Fir Park and I don’t know what to think. I don’t want to dwell too long on the game against the Dutch in the Play Off 2nd Leg but I cannot believe that was the same team that lined up in Glasgow the week before. I honestly cannot remember us stringing more than five passes together or carving out a clear goal scoring opportunity. The players looked lost and we had absolutely nothing going forward. The decision to play Fortune baffles me as It seems obvious that the deal to take him back to West Brom was already done and he was going through the motions without wanting to get injured. I’m stopping there cos I can feel myself getting angry again.

Yesterday was the short trip to Motherwell to take on the Steelmen and the “character” that is Craig Brown. The man that directed a punch at an official of the opposing side in their Europa League tie on Thursday. Brown was jokingly referred to as “Bruiser Brown” and the “Motherwell Mauler” by a paper that I wont mention the name of, it rhymes with Hun. Now take a moment to imagine the headlines if that was Neil Lennon in the same situation...... Would Neil have been afforded the same lighthearted coverage? The “Parkhead Pugilist” perhaps? I think not. The same paper had NINE pages featuring a cracked Celtic crest along with Motherwell’s and Dundee United’s and has yet to give the Huns badge the same treatment despite all their financial woes in recent years. Anyway I digress. It was not the best of games truth be told but all three points were collected and that is all we can really ask for after such a poor showing in midweek. Lenny handed debuts to Fraser Forster and Emilio Izaguirre and they didn’t put a foot, or hand, wrong the whole game. Granted the 6’7” goalie had very little to do over the ninety minutes but when the opportunity came along to give Glenn Loovens a right hook he duly took it without a moments hesitation. A Legend is born haha. Izaguirre had a busier game down the left side and looked composed on the ball and in the challenge and was man of the match in my opinion although ESPN gave the award to Shaun Maloney. There were very few chances in the early stages of the match with the best of them falling to John Sutton. With barely 2 minutes on the clock, a free kick was whipped in and Sutton thankfully couldn’t direct his header on target with very little pressure on him. Our best chance fell to Maloney when he jinked inside the box only to slice his effort into the side netting. There was very little fluidity from Celtic throughout the match and we lacked any imagination or directness until Mr McCourt entered the fray. He constantly picked up the ball and ran at Motherwell’s defenders. Within five minutes of Paddy’s introduction we took the lead. A long clearing header straight down the middle allowed Maloney a run on goal and as the wee man crossed the whitewash into the box the Motherwell defender’s pressure was enough to send Shaun sprawling for a penalty. Now this is where I find it hard to believe..... Dougie McDonald awarded it. Not only that but he red carded Saunders for denying a clear goal scoring opportunity. Has hell frozen over? Daryl Murphy spotted the ball before lifting it high into the top left corner of the net sending the keeper the wrong way. 1-0 and it was to be the only goal of the game.

As I say not a classic but 9 points from 9 and three clean sheets to boot is all that we can ask of a team that has had so much surgery done to it over the last three transfer windows. Hopefully the guys will settle fast and we can kick on from this decent start. It puzzled me that Juarez and Kayal were left on the bench but I suppose that is Lenny’s prerogative.

Tuesday sees silly season come to an end. There will be no more rumour, no sightings, no “my uncle’s a taxi driver and he said..... yadda yadda yadda” The transfer window will be closed till January and we will go with what we got. We could still do with a partner for Big Maj in the centre of defence because Loovens is an accident waiting to happen and Hooiveld needs competition. I’m not sure I will be too happy if we do not have a goalscorer in by Wednesday either as we all know this is an area that we are an injury away from disaster. With Hooper out we are thin on the ground. Samaras isn’t a 20 goals a season striker, neither are Maloney or Murphy. And with Fortune away back down south we need some depth up front. (Not that I’m saying MAF was a 20 a season scorer) Stokes would be good, Keano would be great. Hey you’ve gotta have a dream, eh?

Until next week
KTF
Charlie

Chris’ Blog - August 29

Sun, 29 Aug 2010 16:10:33 -0500

I Put My Socks On, One At a Time.

All week I was sweating the Larsson interview. Would he answer his phone? Would he be comfortable talking to a couple of nobodies about his career? Would we ask him a question he didn’t like and tell us where to go? Would he just give us a Football Focus type of interview with blah, blah, blah answers?

I honestly was looking forward to it, but dreading it at the same time. It wouldn’t have been so bad if we hadn’t have advertised the fact that he was coming on in the previous week’s podcast? Then if it didn’t happen or any of the above scenarios did actually happen, no one, but the LostBhoys Inner Council, would have been any the wiser. Now that we had declared our hand, the pressure was on!

Why was I so stressed? After all, he is a professional? Well, here’s why! When I finally got hold of Henrik for the first time, it was like making a cold call for an advertising company, only this time I was making the call instead of receiving it and let’s be honest, we all hate those types of calls. On many occasions we either hang up or react very sarcastically. Would The King of Kings be just like you and me and hang up on me? Well, no. He was very gracious, but I suspected that he was a little uncomfortable during our chat. He agreed to talk to us at noon on Wednesday. He then asked how long would it last?

“30-35 minutes”, I replied
“You can have 20 minutes” he answered, “it’s dinner time here in Sweden at 7.00pm and I need some family time.”

Fair enough I thought, at least he has agreed to be interviewed and it was kind nice that he valued his family time so much just like the rest of us. But, I just got THAT feeling……..but that’s probably down to my “skeptical” character flaw as much as anything else.

I relayed my concerns to a few of my close confidants, and their answers were all the same – “Relax, Wee Man, you worry things way too much” This is true, but it is Henrik “Freakin” Larsson for goodness sake, this was gonna be one of the most popular LostBhoys interviews ever – I mean EVER!! Regardless of whom we have interviewed in the past and regardless of who we will ever interview again, this was gonna be a big one! I am sure you can see my point….?

My next concern was this, Henrik was to be the first interview we had set up with a real “modern age” superstar. Sure, all the ex-players we have done, up to now, were heroes to us all, but most of them were from a time when footballers were exactly that – “heroes”. But, they were still guys that you would see out and about around Celtic Park on a Saturday. Guys, that you would give a wee shout over to in a pub, or coming out of the game. Guys, who would come over and have a yarn with you, or buy you a beer and have tremendous conversation with. Not a guy who played football as a career, a multi millionaire, who didn’t play for the hoops because he grew up in the streets of Glasgow or Belfast? Not a guy who was just like, you and me, or so I thought……….

So, despite a few sleepless nights, thinking about what “if” or “what might happen”, a few sleepless nights re-reading his books and watching his DVD’s, a few sleepless nights writing and re-writing questions to phrase them properly so that he would understand exactly what I wanted him to answer, Wednesday finally came.

I was ready. I knew more about Henrik Larsson, than probably him or his mother knew. I was ready. I had my notes, my recorder, my lucky Celtic pencil, Hoopy the Hound gunk (for all you oldies that remember Blockbusters from the 80’s) and I was set.

D-Day. Larsson Day. The biggest day in LostBhoys’ short history so far. Yip, all set. Dead set. Good to go. Calm. Ready.

Then it happened.

It was 10.00am and I was relaxed and prepared. Still two hours to go. “You can do this Chris” I kept telling myself, he’s just another bloke. Breathe Chris, Breathe.

Then the phone rang. My phone displayed two letters.

H L

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat? It’s only 10.00am?

He’s gonna cancel?

He has heard Jamie swearing on the podcast and thinks it’s just “not for him”?

His Club has told him he can’t do it?

He has realized that we are not the BBC and it really is beneath him?

He has lost his voice?

He, he, he???????

“Hello Chris?”
“Hello Henrik” – I was so tempted to say “who is this?” but chickened out.
“Hi, Henrik here, about the interview…………” (here we go)
“Can we do it sooner?” said the King,
“S,S,S,Sure” I stuttered.
“How about now?”

Whaaaaaaaaaaaat??????? Now???????? I’m not ready? Where is Gerry? Helllllllpppp?

“Yeah, no problem Sir” Yes, I actually called him Sir – what an ejit.

“Can you give me a minute, I need to get my pal on the line too and print off my questions?”
“Sure, call me back when you are ready, but I only have an hour or so before I need to do something else” said H.L.

Hmmmmmmmmm. An hour? Not 20 minutes? Yipppeeeeeeeeeee!!

“Fantastic”, I replied, ”Call you back”.
I hung up and speed dialed Big Gerry (TOCCSC).

No answer.
Called again.
No answer.
Called again.
“Larsson, my Henrik Laaaaaaarsson” the voice on the other end of the phone sang merrily,”You make me haaaaaaaaappeeeeeee when skies are Grey”
“He wants to talk NOW ya plonker” I roared down the phone, “stop singing!! Are ya ready?”
“Born ready” Gerry replied.
“Okay, don’t hang up”
As Gerry muttered questions about why would he hang up and why was I so uptight, I hit print on my computer to run off the questions.
I ran out to the printer. Nothing. Five seconds later. Nothing. Five seconds later (that felt like five hours) the Xerox machine that was kept so clean, started to spit out the pages.
I ran back to the phone.
“Gerry, you still there?”
“Aye, where do you think I would be?”
Then he yelled”CHRIS, CALM THE “F” DOWN”
“Whaaaaaaaat?” I replied “Henrik Larsson is waiting to be phoned by us and you want me to calm down?”
“Chris, he is just like you and me, he puts one sock on at a time”

I was stopped in my tracks. Superstars wear socks? They put them on one at a time? He’s just like you and me (I hope he’s not like me).

Stop. I stopped. My mind went blank for a split second.

I was calm. The Big Lump had done it again. The Ying to my Yang. The calm to my storm.

I dialed.

The phone answered.

“Hello, Henrik?” I said.

The rest you can hear on the podcast.

http://www.lostbhoys.com/www.lostbhoys.com/Podcast/Entries/2010/8/27_Podcast_59_-_Henrik_Larsson.html

Krys’ Blog - August 28

Sat, 28 Aug 2010 20:49:02 -0500

Well here’s a novelty - I only have one game to preview this week! Sadly I suspect that novelty is going to wear off very quickly after recent events ensured less midweek football. With the European qualifiers now out of the way and making way for their international counterparts next weekend, we’re looking to round off the first full month of competitive football with a win at Motherwell. I’m not the only one getting a novelty this week though, as Celtic will also get the novelty of playing on grass at Fir Park and not potatoes and sand. I know, I can scarcely believe it myself but the Fir Park pitch is actually looking quite lush right now. In fact it put the Inverness pitch to shame which looked pretty bad on the camera side wing a couple of weeks ago. But before we get too excited about Fir Park’s new found greenness, lets see if it’s still looking like that in February.

Celtic looked to be heading into the game with renewed optimism - maximum points taken from the first two SPL matches, having scored five goals and conceded none. I’ll admit, I didn’t see that last stat coming given our pre-season leakiness, so full credit to the bhoys for that one. Stats aside, the performances in the second half against Inverness and the full matches at home against Utrecht and St Mirren had given the fans renewed enthusiasm. Entertaining AND effective football. And they said such a combination thing was a myth! Well I didn’t, but that’s besides the point.

Of course, that all appears to have been binned after Thursday night, along with European football for another season. Sadly, despite Conall’s build up we may have to wait until Harper’s blog on Monday to talk about the game properly because by the time I found a decent stream to watch the game, we were already 3-0 down. All I could go on is what I read on Twitter as I was trying to find one, and I’d rather not venture down the route of second hand information too much. For what it’s worth though the general consensus was that there were questions regarding the penalties for the first two goals as well as the headbutt on Brown - that would indicate yet another poor/weak European referee for us - but the major worries were the performance of the team... or more accurately the complete and sudden lack of one. A lack of passion, a lack of passing ability - it was like something out of last season. What on earth happened between last week and this week?!

One thing I won’t be blaming is the bumblebee top! It seems to be the done thing to suggest it’s the jinx. Well, tell that to the players that stopped the ten - they wore the original one as an away kit that season. Not to mention we haven’t been wearing it all through the last few years of disappointing away trips in Europe. I still say it’s a cracking kit and I won’t be burning mine any time soon, that’s for sure. I’m far more concerned with what’s in the bumblebee kit performing to be honest.

Lennon’s post match interview wasn’t as eyebrow raising as the one he gave after Ross County last season, but he sounded just as disappointed as the rest of us by what the team had failed to offer up. How Lennon handles things now could make or break his time as Celtic manager. After all, while a handful never forgave Strachan for the Artmedia debacle, he did last four seasons due mainly to the fact he won the league in the first three of those and went on to improve matters in Europe somewhat with consecutive qualifications from the Champions League group stages. One of the major things Strachan did to stop the rot was to drop key personnel - David Marshall and Stan Varga more or less didn’t play for Celtic again after the 4-4 draw at Fir Park which followed the Artmedia away leg - a curious coincidence that we should be visiting that stadium again after a heavy European defeat. It will be interesting to see if Lennon does something similar. Certainly a few eyebrows were raised when Brown - the Celtic captain - was subbed off midway through the second half. Although you could knock that on the head by pointing out he’d been booked for being headbutted...

Whatever Lennon does, lets hope it’s the right thing. Without Europe to distract there can be no excuses for not regaining the SPL title now - which was always priority number one this season anyway. Over to you Neil - starting on Sunday. We’re all right behind you. Well, most of us anyway. I’d just ignore the rest.

Fortunately for us, Motherwell may be just as disappointed as we are as they’ve had a mixed start to the season. Actually, they might be even more disappointed - I don’t remember Lennon punching anyone after all! Craigy Broon, never knew you had it in you!

Despite being the better team for much of the first half against Hibs in their opening game, they conceded a later first half equaliser courtesy of the possibly now Celtic bound Anthony Stokes and went on to be second best in the second half, losing the game 3-2. Things were a bit better away to Kilmarnock last weekend, coming away with a 1-0 win which was an improvement if far from convincing.

Motherwell’s real progress had been in the Europa League qualifiers, having made it through two qualifying rounds - rounds which saw Hibs come and go again - where they picked up three victories, a draw, a narrow away defeat in their most recent round before a disappointing home defeat finally knocked them out along with ourselves and Dundee United. The Scottish UEFA coefficient takes another kicking and now relies solely on Rangers in the Champions League. Ouch. Fact is though, due to these qualfiers Motherwell are probably the only team in Scotland to have played more games this season than us already!

Their key player in my eyes is the most obvious name on the teamsheet - that of John Sutton, Chris’s younger brother - who got the opening goal against Hibs. Like his brother, he’s always a bit of a handful for the defence to deal with and I’m sure he’ll be no different should he play against us on Sunday. Motherwell’s winner last weekend was scored by Nick Blackman, who is on loan from Blackburn Rovers and appears to be a bit of a find. And of course there’s um... douche bag pundit um... Mark Hateley’s um... son, um... Tom. He’s got a bit of a reputation for being good on the old free kick front and, given how we’ve lost some goals in pre-season and in Braga, we may want to avoid giving away too many and letting him make the most of the opportunity.

As per the SPL split, Motherwell got the short straw with the fixtures last season and had to visit Celtic Park three times. Or to put that another way, we only had to play on the tattie field once last season. That game came in the middle of December and we were served up a 3-2 thriller. Georgios Samaras gave us the lead in the first 15 minutes, but despite being the better team we found ourselves 2-1 down at the break. No matter though, as Aiden McGeady soon leveled things early into the second half. The winning goal though was a thing of beauty - a Marc-Antoine Fortune screamer, giving his critics something to write about... as his goal celebration indicated.

The other games last season against Motherwell saw a 0-0 draw in October, a ground out 2-1 win just days after the Ross County nightmare in April - Josh Thompson getting both goals after Motherwell took the lead - before a 4-0 thrashing a couple of weeks later at the start of May. That final game was not as exciting as the score line suggested with all four goals coming in the second half, although I do remember the last ten minutes or so being well worth attending the game - if only to witness James Forrest score his first goal for the club. And although there was hope he’d get at least one against Rangers the following midweek, the final goal in injury time was also Robbie Keane’s last at Celtic Park of his loan spell.

When I think of games at Fir Park against Motherwell though, there’s one moment that always springs to mind. Well, okay, two moments spring to mind but I’m not talking about one of them as there’s been enough doom and gloom already. Bear with me a minute on this one and I’ll set the scene.

When I was younger, I grew up watching Airwolf. There was always a moment in the episode somewhere where Airwolf would disappear in a cloud of smoke or behind a mountain or something else to obscure it, before it came flying into view and vanquished everything in sight. Right, well imagine instead of the smoke or the mountain it’s four Motherwell defenders. Then imagine it’s not Airwolf but it is actually Henrik Larsson. This is how my mind works sometimes, disturbing isn’t it?

Anyway, Larsson runs into the defenders almost disappearing from view in doing so, but still manages to come out with the ball and slots it away past the keeper. That goal was the third in a massive 7-1 win for Celtic back in February 1999. Henrik went on to score another two after that goal, adding to the penalty he had slotted home to open the scoring. The goal typified the legend that is Larsson. No one in Scotland could touch him, not even FOUR defenders ganging up on him at the same time.

Of all the players I’ve had the pleasure to watch play for Celtic, Henrik is by far the best of them. That’s not taking away from the others that I’ve regarded as Celtic heroes to me - Dziekanowski, Elliott, McStay, Collins, Van Hooijdonk, Moravcik, Mjallby, Sutton, Petrov, Nakamura, Boruc... I could be here all day rhyming them off. These guys were all brilliant in their own way, but none of them could touch Larsson in my eyes. Henrik had it all - the goals, the assists, the flair, the hair, the skill, and maybe most importantly the old fashioned decency and respect so rare in the modern footballer these days. How many footballers stay at a club because they’re happy to be there when they could move off somewhere else for more money or the chance to possibly get further in bigger competitions? Not many that’s for sure. Besides, Henrik did that when he’d finished his time at Celtic anyway!

So many of my favourite Celtic memories involve Henrik somewhere along the line. How many goals did he give us on the road to Seville? I’m fairly sure my dad betting on Celtic to win and Larsson to score first paid for our trip to see him score another two goals in Seville itself. The phenonemnal 53 goals he got in the treble season. The history saving stopping of the ten. The beating of Barca... aye, okay, so that was Thommo who scored the goal, but who set him up? Henrik really is the King of Kings in my eyes... aye, okay, better than that, he is Ghod.

As I write this, I’ve just finished listening to this week’s podcast. There’s no doubt in my mind it’s one of the best. While I’m jealous of Chris and Gerry, I’m glad it wasn’t me interviewing him. If it had been, it would have been me gibbering like an idiot for a hour - which would have been no good since they didn’t have him for an hour! Hell, I’m struggling not to gibber like an idiot just writing about him! Even then though, if Henrik could get a word or two in between my gibbering it would still be great to hear him talk about his brilliant career and how he feels about Celtic. Fortunately Chris and Gerry are better at this sort of thing than I am and ask all the right questions to get the best out of him.

Actually, why are you still reading this? Go download the podcast and listen already! It’s FAR more interesting, and FAR happier! You can always come back to me next week! I’ve already listened and I’m going to go listen to it again!

Love you Henrik x ;-)

Conall’s Blog - August 27

Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:19:25 -0500

A tale of two blogs!

Hello to all, I hope everyone is doing well, although I very much doubt that is the case. First things first i'd like to apologise for missing my blog last week, I had intended to write it after the first leg against Utrecht to give everyone my take on the game but a few things came up and I was unable to do so. I'm sure you were all glad to get a week off from my nonsense but not to worry, i'm back now and boy am I depressed. Anyone who is in a good mood please read a blog from earlier on in the week as this will no doubt send you over the edge!

I had a very good blog written up before going out to watch the second leg of the tie, it was full of optimism and praise for the team but that has been scrapped in favour of an apocalyptic style narrative on how our season is over and we are terrible. Tonight I feel numb, I have just watched one of the most disgraceful games of football ever and if I'm honest the last thing I want to be doing at the moment is writing a blog about Celtic. It was reminiscent of that night in Paisley last march. The SPL is our goal this season, that has been said over and over again but it is still not acceptable for Celtic to get beaten 4-0 by anyone. Our away form in Europe is laughable at best and it is the same old story no matter who we play. I think the bumblebee strip has been a curse! The most annoying thing for me at this present time is not the fact that we have went out of European competition but it is the fact that after a few decent results and a few games where we looked like a team, we are back to square one and it's doom and gloom, Lenny must go!

Maybe we all got a bit too far ahead of ourselves after some convincing performances but it's back down to earth with a bang now. It's disappointing being out of Europe and it is testament to how far we have come from the now distant days of O'Neill but the only half positive diamond in the dirt that I can take from tonight is that it gives us no choice but to concentrate solely on the league. As I write this I'm finding it hard to really say anything of note as mentally I was prepared for an upbeat blog about how rosie the garden is and how it was great to have won four games on the bounce but hey that's out the window completely.

The game itself was a disaster of sorts with Celtic offering nothing in the way of attacking play. I'll be the first to admit it that I was conned by the myth of Samaras and his early season form but when it comes to the crunch he is about as useful as a one legged man in an arse kicking contest. Same goes for Fortune. I love these two players when they are on their game but to see them play well is becoming the exception rather than the rule and it's time to go. Standards must be kept and we need players in capable of scoring goals and standing up when it matters. I have no doubt Sammy and MAF would be decent this season in the SPl but as a point of principle I would get rid now as we will be back here this time next year! In terms of people playing okay tonight I think Kayal was the only one who at times wanted to do something with a bit of urgency, the rest seemed beat from the first whistle. The second penalty was a bad decision in my opinion but that is neither here nor there as there was only one team capable of winning tonight.

Right thats my take on tonight, I'm going to forget it ever happened and go on to part 2 of my blog if you want to call it that as this is the stuff I had written pre game and I may as well post it up as well. I will leave the honour of properly dissecting tonights game to the very capable Krys Kujawa.

Sundays game at home to St Mirren was a very special day for me, I don't get to Celtic part as often as I would like so it is always great to get back but Sunday was even better than usual as it was the day I took my nephew to his first Celtic game. He is 11 and I am 21 so our relationship is more that of brothers than uncle and nephew and I had been looking forward to introducing him to Celtic from as far back as I can remember. He watches most games with me in the local "celtic pub" but the proud day finally arrived where the both of us went to paradise together! Phase one of his indoctrina.....sorry, celtic experience was complete.

I recently listened back to a podcast where Chris was talking about the benefit of bringing along the younger generations of supporters to the clubs to interact with fellow fans and he touched on how this is so much better than merely watching the games at home. I think this is definitely the case. We had a great day on Sunday and the whole experience was something that neither of us will forget. We arrived at Parkhead in time to catch the tail end of the Green Brigades welcoming committee and armed with a new hoops jersey with Juarez 4 on the back we set off to get the wee man his first hoops scarf. I still have my first ever hoops scarf and it has been with me through good and bad so it's a ritual I wanted to uphold and I hope my nephews scarf brings him some much needed luck and it sees some good days soon. The whole day could not have went any better, from the banter on the bus and boat over, the atmosphere outside the ground and the game itself, the whole thing was great and I noticed within a few hours of getting home how he was really enthusiastic about the team, asking me more questions than usual(which believe me, is harder than it seems) and looking up celtic websites, youtube videos and reading old celtic fanzines I had in the house. He can't wait to go back and I can't wait to take him.

The highlight of the trip outwith the football was the giggle we had at the drunk guy getting the bokes on the boat home, he made an almighty mess of the HSS floor much to our sadistic enjoyment A special thanks must go to the Erin Go Bragh CSC who we travelled with on Sunday, in particular Aiden, Brian and Chris who were great in making sure we had everything we needed for the day and making us both feel more than welcome. I would recommend them to anyone looking to travel to Celtic. Also a big thank you to our very own Gary McGeady for putting me in touch with the CSC. It was much appreciated!

The football side of Sundays game has been covered in depth by the other bloggers but I'll quickly add my own two cents worth of things that caught my eye. This might seem like a load of pish after what has went on tonight but it's how I felt after Sundays game! The team mentality is something that came under scrutiny last year and rightly so as we were a team of no hopers who gave up without a fight. The change I noticed on Sunday was astronomical and in particular from people like Juarez, Brown, Maloney, Majstorovic and Kayal. They were constantly talking to each other, helping each other and fighting for each other. I noticed that after a mere 2 minutes of play Kayal was infuriated with both Brown and Juarez for not giving him the ball when he was in space. It is this kind of hunger and winning attitude that I think will be the main difference from the celtic of last year. From the sidelines the entire coaching team were out willing the team on, pointing out their mistakes and praising their successes. I also noted Lennons now customary slamming of the water bottle when Scott Brown made a sideways pass to Ledley instead of picking out Maloney ahead of him. I will put a slight disclaimer on this optimism, which would have been prevalent before tonight's catastrophe, and say that I realise we have only played two league games against lower level teams but after enduring such a horrendous time last season I think it is only right to enjoy these recent good performances and be positive and buoyant. That's what has got me with tonight's game as the result and performance more than anything has put a spanner in the works of us building up some momentum and staying positive. To put a spin on it, it could maybe be the grounding that we need as we can't afford complacency in the league this year.

I think we will be fine in the SPL this year, tonight aside, we have looked good and with a few more additions I think things will go our way. Talk of late is of Anthony Stokes joining the club which although not the marquee signing we had been promised, would be a good addition. He is a player who I think would score bucket loads for Celtic and he has that arrogance about him that I think Celtic lack. If he signs then It is almost certainly good night Vienna for Sammy and MAF and not a moment too soon!

I'll conclude by saying that despite the doom and gloom I can't wait for Sundays game, I think we will be back on track and a good win against Motherwell will soon put tonight's result behind us as we march on to win the league.

Hail Hail
Conall.