Never take success for granted, 1995 Scottish cup win taught us that.

It’s Scottish cup final week and on Saturday we take on Inverness aiming for our 41st win in the competition. No one has won the old trophy more than Celtic.

There has been many memorable Scottish cup final wins in our illustrious history, one of them was in 1995 when we defeated Airdrie to end a barren spell of six years without silverware.

It wasn’t a great game in terms of football, but history doesn’t remember that, it only remembers the winners and we achieved our aim that day thanks to an early Pierre Van Hoojidonk goal.

The image of Peter Grant in tears at the end stick in the mind, a true Celtic man, Peter was superb that day playing through the pain barrier and was deservedly named man of the match. The phrase playing for the jersey is an over hyped cliche, but Peter did just that on a day he helped the club end years of anguish.

It was Paul McStay’s first and only honour as skipper. It was Tommy Burns only honour as Manager, two Celtic legends. Both were as overjoyed as the supporters that day and deserved it so much.

Youngsters today will not understand the significance of a solitary Scottish cup final win, they have grown up in an era the club has been the dominant force in Scottish football and trophy’s are seen as the norm and winning is taken for granted.

Back then it very different. Those dark days of the early 1990s have allowed us auld yins to appreciate every minute of the success we enjoy today.

We appreciated that win so much back in May 1995. As we watched Paul McStay lift the trophy we knew it was a cornerstone. We had went so long being deprived of success. This win was a monkey off the back and a signal we were about to witness the start of something special.

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Ange rumours not ideal, but let’s not jump the gun. There’s a treble to be won.

The Ange Postecoglou to Spurs rumours have been gathering pace the past few days. you’d be lying if you said it didn’t worry you, and while it’s ok to talk about it, some are taking it to the extreme.

There has even been discussions on Twitter about who is in the running to replace Ange! The name of Brendan Rodgers has even been banded about! I know Twitter is a strange place at the best of times, but they do tend to dramatise things much too often.

The man hasn’t even said he is leaving yet, and while I myself think it’s a 50/50 chance of him staying, I still have confidence he will remain at the club, although the phone a friend option he has in Scott Munn is a bit of a worry. I’m sure his audience at Celtic park can persuaded him to stay.

What better way than to showcase that at Hampden on Saturday. A win against Inverness and a historic treble could convince him to stay, and of course another crack at the champions league next season.

Ange is still here, let’s look forward to making history on Saturday and show the man how much he would be missing if he did leave. Worrying about things outwith your control, and talking about possible replacements is for another day. Stop worrying and focus on Saturday.

Hopefully we will be celebrating a historic treble, if so enjoy the moment, and then turn your thoughts to the future.

Ange rumours won’t go away

A report by Dan Kilpatrick of the Evening Standard this morning made for worrying reading regarding Ange Postecoglou.

Dan is a reliable source when it comes to all things Spurs and is usually bang on the money when it comes to news regarding the North London side.

According to Dan, Spurs owner Daniel Levy is an admirer of Ange, and incoming Chief Football officer Scott Munn knows fellow Aussie Ange personally. This is not the news that the Celtic support will want to hear.

Apparently levy and Munn will start the ball rolling after Saturdays scottish cup final as they plan to lure Ange to North London.

It now looks like it will be down to Ange himself to make a decision on his future, and It will be a big one for him to make. He’s only human after all and will naturally be interested in what Spurs have to offer.

We just have to hope and pray he wants to stay and achieve more at Celtic, such as champions league progression. Next week will give us an inkling to what his next steps will be. Fingers crossed he wants to further his stay in Glasgow.

a season of Impressive numbers

Looking back on another successful campaign which will hopefully end with a treble on Saturday, makes for very impressing reading especially when it comes to numbers.

32 wins in 38 league games, a total of 99 points with 114 goals scored and 34 conceded. The most wins, the most number of goals, the least goals conceded and the least number of defeats is the most impressive in the league and that’s why we are of course the best team in the country.

Over the season as a whole in every competition we hit a whopping 144 goals in 52 games. That’s an impressive amount.

Those goals were shared between 21 players with 4 coming from own goals. Only seven of those goals came from the penalty spot, making it even more impressive.

For the all the stats obsessed out there Kyogo of course leads the way with 33 of those goals with Jota second weighing in with 14, Liel Abada with 12, Daizen Maeda 11, Giorgos Giakoumakis 9, Reo Hatate 9, Oh 7, Aaron Mooy 7, Callum McGregor, David Turnbull, Sead Haksabanovic, and James forrest all with 5, Matt O’Riley 4, Greg Taylor and Carl Starfelt 3, Moritz Jenz 2, and CCV, Bernabei, Welsh, Juranovic and Alistair Johnston all with solitary strikes to their names.

Remarkable stats indeed proving that we work as a team, 144 goals is a brilliant return of goals at any level of football, let’s hope we add a few more to it when the season draws to a close on Saturday evening, and hopefully with another trophy in the cabinet.

Return to sender

It’s been reported that Inverness Caley Thistle have failed to sell their ticket allocation for Saturdays Scottish cup final, meaning any unsold briefs will have to be returned resulting in good news for Celtic supporters who will snap them up in no time.

I said at the time that the 8,000 tickets allocated to Inverness was more than generous and that has proven to be correct. It’s estimated that they shifted six thousand so those who were saying that the highland side should be getting in excess of 10,000 will be feeling extremely foolish.

Average attendances should always be took into account when Ticket allocations are being shared out. Sides like Inverness who have an average attendance of around 3000, and have around 1500 season ticket holders can’t grumble about getting such a small number, that’s the gist of it.

Expecting sides with a small support to shift so many briefs is mind boggling, it can also lead to tickets being sold on for excessive sums online, or being sold to rival supporters and that of course brings its own dangers.

An injustice that still hurts.

Mentioning the name Inverness and Scottish cup in the same sentence is enough to send shivers through almost every Celtic supporter.

Moments such as that disastrous night in February 2000 which signalled the end of the John Barnes era, silver clouds eh? Or when Martin O’Neill’s side were beaten by John Robertsons thistle side in 2003 at the quarter final stage, just days after we beat Liverpool at Anfield in the UEFA cup quarter finals.

John Hughes thistle side also shocked us in 2015 as they put the stoppers on Ronny Deila’s chance of a Treble, a defeat that hurts just as much as the other ones, possibly even more.

Of course we would lose 3-2 on the day, but we were robbed big time. I know we performed poorly but the officials blundered massively by producing one of the biggest ever honest mistakes on record.

With Celtic leading 1-0 and on the stroke of half time, Josh Meekings stopped Lee Griffiths from converting a header with a clear handball on the line. A clear a red card offence and a penalty as you’ll ever see, but no, to the amazement to everyone in the ground and those watching on TV, both referee Stevie McLean and goal line assistant Alan Muir ‘failed’ to spot it.

It was an unforgivable ‘error’ of huge consequences. Celtic were denied the chance of a spot kick and the advantage of playing against ten men. It of course didn’t materialise, and instead it was Celtic who were reduced to ten men in the second half when Craig Gordon saw red. We would of course lose after extra time, denying Ronny the chance of a dream treble.

I know it’s a big ‘what if’ but if justice had prevailed we would have had the chance of a spot kick to make it 2-0, Inverness with ten men would have struggled to come back. Even if we missed I’m confident we would have still overpowered them, thus having a shot at a treble against Falkirk in the final.

Inverness of course would go on to win the final, but it could have been a treble season for Ronny Deila. What could have been, I guess it wasn’t meant to be, but the injustice still cuts deep.

Andy Payton, decent striker in a time of crisis.

During the turbulent times of the early 1990s there wasn’t a lot to shout about for Celtic supporters and decent players were thin on the ground. We of course had the likes of John Collins and Paul McStay but we were missing a centre forward, someone who could regularly find the back of the net.

Liam Brady had spent a million on Tony Cascarino who wasn’t a success, actually he was totally fecking useless, lasting just six months before being punted to Chelsea.

Gerry Creaney done his best but was hardly prolific, Tommy Coyne struggled with injury and loss of form and Charlie Nicholas was past his best.

Brady tried to rectify that by signing Englishman Andy Payton from Middlesbrough in a swap deal which seen Chris Morris head the opposite way.

Andy arrived at Celtic with a good pedigree as a proven striker in the lower leagues of English football. Celtic fans welcomed him to Celtic park, but weren’t totally optimistic giving Brady’s track record on strikers from England.

Andy took a a wee bit to settle but soon began to find the net, the goal he scored in a win at Celtic park against Rangers stands out, especially as it helped stop their unbeaten run that season.

He was never a top class striker, but he was decent all the same and gave one hundred and ten percent every time he played. He is still held in high regard by the Celtic supporters for his efforts during turbulent times.

A return of 20 goals in 46 appearances was a decent return in a poor Celtic side. Lou Macari took over from Liam Brady and would rival his predecessors transfer dealings when he allowed Andy to return to England in a swap deal that would see the infamous Wayne Biggins head up north.

Andy continued to bang the goals in down south for Barnsley, Huddersfield and Burnley over the next decade. When he finally hung up his boots he had a career total of 226 goals in 588 games, not a bad record indeed.

Deflecting from the truth

Rangers supporters have being doing what they do best this week, deflecting from the truth. In doing so they need to find a target to unleash their venom at.

This weeks unfortunate victim is the first minister Humza Yousaf, admittedly not the most competent of MPs and he is a self confessed Celtic supporter, but wanting him to condemn something that didn’t happen is a bit of a stretch.

The hordes are of course fuming because Humza tore a strip off them when they caused chaos as they rampaged in the city celebrating their clubs first title back in 2021, but he was right. It was during a lockdown when everyone was on restrictions, also police officers were assaulted and city property was destroyed as the bears had their very own Royal rumble in George square. It’s not on a par with our celebrations on Saturday. No where near it.

This doesn’t register in the minds of the deluded Rangers supporters though, they need a figure to blame for their woes after another disappointing season. One week it’s a referee, the next the SFA, the next it’s, well anyone that has the misfortune to be in the firing line.

It’s just their nature, they need a victim to blame for their woes. The facts don’t matter to them.

The destruction of Manchester wasn’t the fault of oldco supporters in 2008. Administration and Liquidation weren’t the faults of David Murray and Craig Whyte. The pitch riots at Hampden against Hibs weren’t their faults. Having to drink toilet water in seville wasn’t their fault.

You get the picture, they know deep down that their club is a financial basket case, and will always be second best to Celtic. They just need a fall guy to aim their frustrations at.

The problem though is much closer to home, they only need to take a good look in the mirror to see what the real source of their problems are.

Winners at every level.

Congratulations to the Celtic woman’s side who beat Rangers woman to win the Scottish cup yesterday at Hampden, erasing some of the pain inflicted from last weeks cruel blow of losing the title.

Fran Alonsos side being victorious means that we have won something at every level this season from the men’s side, the youths and of course the woman, and even more satisfying it’s came at the expense of the Rangers.

One image from yesterday’s woman’s final at Hampden summed up the class of both sides. Or lack of class should I say.

That was of course the Rangers woman’s skipper Kathryn Hill cowardly shoving Amy Gallagher in the back and knocking her to the ground. Such behaviour goes against the much hyped ‘dignity’ that the club likes to associate itself with.

Her assistant manager Craig McPherson will have been proud of her. She even took her runners up medal off in disgust at the end. You’d think like mens captain James Tavernier she would be well versed in being a loser.

Glasgow Celtic, winners at every level. Long May it continue.

Return of Ajeti. What’s next?

Albian Ajeti has returned to Celtic after Sturm Graz decided against taking up their option to buy the Swiss striker.

Ajeti of course had spent the season on loan at the Austrian Bundesliga runners up, but much like his time at Celtic it wasn’t a success as injuries restricted him to just 15 league appearances in which he scored 3 goals.

Ajeti signed for Celtic for a fee believe to be in the region of £5 million. That’s a lot of money for a club with our resources so it has to go down as a signing in the ‘flop’ category.

Ajeti came to the club with a great pedigree and although he didn’t hit it off with West Ham he had shown he was a decent player with Basel in his native Switzerland. Great things were expected of him when he arrived in Glasgow, but unfortunately he never lived up to his promise.

Now he’s back, Will Ange give him another chance? Does he deserve another crack at the whip? These are questions that will need to be answered soon as with only one year remaining on his contact, it can’t be put to the side.

It’s extremely unlikely Ange will see him having a future at the club, although you never say never, plus with his injury record and loss of form he’s not going to attract any decent offers, so the club might look to cut their losses. Time will tell.