Celtic Future

[Danyel1980]

I must say Scottish league is very poor, since there is no Glasgow Rangers rivals for Celtic.
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Quote: Originally Posted by Fedal180

What do people think about the future of Scottish soccer, because right now it's at an all time low, Celtic have the chance to be 21 up on the second place team and have not lost a game yet. Would love to hear input

[jasontoddwhitt]

Scottish football is in a sad state right now. Celtic can pretty much have their name engraved on the SPL trophy for the next ten years. No other club can challenge them for their Champions League spot, and with the disparity in money, that gap will widen. Several clubs are in dire financial straights. Rangers are on the way back, but they are still a couple years away from getting back to the SPL, and probably another 3-5 from challenging for a spot in the Europa League. They can't attract the talent that they used too, nor keep their good talent.

[Fedal180]

Quote: Originally Posted by jasontoddwhitt

Scottish football is in a sad state right now. Celtic can pretty much have their name engraved on the SPL trophy for the next ten years. No other club can challenge them for their Champions League spot, and with the disparity in money, that gap will widen. Several clubs are in dire financial straights. Rangers are on the way back, but they are still a couple years away from getting back to the SPL, and probably another 3-5 from challenging for a spot in the Europa League. They can't attract the talent that they used too, nor keep their good talent.

Do you think that it can be saved, it's still fun to play with in FIFA at least lol

[ChrisR]

Quote: Originally Posted by jasontoddwhitt

Scottish football is in a sad state right now. Celtic can pretty much have their name engraved on the SPL trophy for the next ten years. No other club can challenge them for their Champions League spot, and with the disparity in money, that gap will widen. Several clubs are in dire financial straights. Rangers are on the way back, but they are still a couple years away from getting back to the SPL, and probably another 3-5 from challenging for a spot in the Europa League. They can't attract the talent that they used too, nor keep their good talent.

As a season ticket holder at Hibernian (Hibs) for 20 years who also attends 90% of away matches, as well as attending several away matches in the Europa League this is one subject I am qualified to speak on. As ever when people look at Scottish football from outside they always tend to look at it from the point of view of the gap between "The Old Firm" (as they used to be known) and the rest and use that as a barometer of health. Obviously with the liquidation of Rangers in 2013 this position has been exacerbated with Celtic running away with the league this season although it should be bourne in mind that Celtic actually lost seven games last season and only cliched the championship with 5 games to spare - no more onesided than many of the leagues in Europe last season.

Actually in terms of attendances Scotland still has the best-attended professional top-league in Europe per head of population and this will only improve once The Rangers FC (for avoidance of doubt a new entity founded 2012 completely unrelated with Rangers FC who have been consigned to history forever and will never "come back" from anywhere!) are likely to make their Premiership debut in 2015.

The main problem in Scotland is the geographical proximity to England (Edinburgh is only 90 minutes drive from Newcastle for example, Manchester less than 3 hrs from Glasgow) and there will always be a drain in players going south of the border, due to the difference in prestige and financial disparity brought on by the ludicrous broadcast deals in English football - so the better young kids don't stick around in Scotland too long.

The historical hegemony of Rangers & Celtic dominating, mainly due to success founded on religious bigotry, has never been challenged - most of the clubs in Scotland accept they will not be winning a championship anytime soon so the main objectives are generally redefined as to 1) Qualify for Europe 2) Win either of the domestic cups 3) Make a profit 4) Play attractive football 5) Develop local youngsters into first-team players and sell them on, much preferably to English clubs (which actually assists with objective 3) rather than to Rangers or Celtic.

Its not about Scottish clubs buying in talent anymore, basically the clubs apart from Celtic stopped paying significant transfer fees years ago. My club Hibs spent £200,000 in the summer on James Collins from Swindon Town in English League One and that was seen a "big signing" in Premiership terms!

Its not obvious to the outside viewer but in terms of youth development structures the clubs within Scotland are well down the path to building a more sustainable future. Dundee United in particular have some players of excellent potential (Gauld, Mackay-Steven, Soutar, Robertson) and Hearts (admittedly through financial neccessity) are basically fielding eight players 21 or under most weeks while most of the other Premiership clubs have youngsters either playing regularly or about to break through (Naismith at St Mirren, Johnston at Kilmarnock, Stanton at Hibs, May at St Johnstone to name a few). In the lower divisions (ie the Championship) there is a heavy focus on youth development at Falkirk, Hamilton and Livingston to name but three, and all these clubs have produced players in the last 10 years who have gone on to do well in the English Premiership (at least as well as can be expected from country of just 5 million people).