Now that would be a day to remember.
I can see the UEFA CL fantasy league taking a big swing next week. Myself, Bandage, Captainshan are off to see some of our players playing in the flesh. Other managers are relying solely on video evidence and I think that will count against them in the long run.
I’m going to mail Milan today and ask them for a half hour window with Kaka after the game just so I can point out to him how important he is to my team.
therock67 wrote:
Now that would be a day to remember.
I can see the UEFA CL fantasy league taking a big swing next week. Myself, Bandage, Captainshan are off to see some of our players playing in the flesh. Other managers are relying solely on video evidence and I think that will count against them in the long run.
I’m going to mail Milan today and ask them for a half hour window with Kaka after the game just so I can point out to him how important he is to my team.
Get back to me with you insights, Kaka is my captain. Let him know Flano was asking after him.
As for video evidence, its more than what Staunton uses 
Rumours abounding Celtic message boards that Mark Wilson’s knee is fooked again. He injured it away to the huns last December and possibly came back too soon and played the first leg against Milan before aggravating it again and then missing the back end of last season. Apparently he got himself fully fit over the summer but he’s been missing since the Donetsk game. There’s even talk that he’s out for the season and they’re getting him over to Steadman in the US. It’ll be a shame if it’s true because he was excellent when he first joined and these injuries are holding him back.
Wilson’s injury is confirmed and this is pretty bad news to be honest. With his quotes about only being able to train 2 times a week it perhaps explains why he hasn’t been himself. It’s also surprising we didn’t sign some proper full back cover over the summer. Just down to Doumb and Naylor with only other options being playing centre backs out of position or parachuting reserve/youth players in.
Wilson positive over op
by Bert Mitchell
MARK WILSON is feeling “pretty positive” as he heads for a crucial consultation in Colorado with knee specialist Dr Richard Steadman.
The 23-year-old Celtic full-back has been playing through persistent problems with his right knee. He has been able to train only two days a week and his form has dipped.
Wilson missed the last two games against Hibs and Dundee and will now miss next week’s Champions League home crunch with AC Milan.
The young defender has finally decided he needs to see the man who saved team-mate John Kennedy’s career.
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And he revealed: "I am pretty positive about going out to the States. I am going to get Mr Steadman’s opinion on my right knee and to see what road it is best to go down.
“I have had problems with it in the past and, to be honest, I have been plagued with it for a while. In that respect I wasn’t doing myself or the team any favours by trying to play through it. It is definitely the right thing to try and get it sorted out now. At 23, I was only able to train two days a week and that just shouldn’t be the case. So something had to be done.”
Wilson and Celtic medical staff will head for the US early next week. Should surgery be recommend, he will have it immediately.
Wilson said: “Mr Steadman saved John Kennedy’s career and also did some work for Shaun Maloney but, to be honest, we are not sure what will happen until we see him.”
When the defender does return he will resume training at the Hoops’ Lennoxtown training centre, which will open next month.
First team coach Tommy Burns says the 8million, 50-acre complex will be the envy of Europe. "It’s time a club like Celtic had this facility. It goes side by side with the tradition. The players won’t just enjoy it, the supporters will enjoy it as well.
"This club is now about bringing in players from all over the world. It is only right that we can show these players we are at the same sort of a level as other big clubs.
“I went out to Milan, and all over Italy there are lots of pitches but nothing extravagant, just basic facilities, average at best, even at Juventus. So clubs there would be impressed by what we have.”
The site is as yet only half developed, with four full-sized pitches and one artificial. There is also a warm-up area for goalkeepers, an indoor pitch, a high-tech gym plus a host of other modern facilities.
Burns has no doubts legendary Celtic boss Jock Stein would have been impressed.
Burns said: "In Jock’s day a training ground wasn’t such a big thing. We didn’t look for anything luxurious just somewhere decent to train.
“But I think Jock would be well pleased.”
Bad news about Wilson. I actually thought he’d played well the last couple of games but before then he’d been on a very poor run of form.
At least we have Doumb as a replacement and it will be a big test for him.
Celtic have a few injury doubts ahead of Milan’s visit to Glasgow on Wednesday. With Jan Johannes Vennegoor of Hesselink picking up a hamstring injury yesterday he’s unlikely to make it back in time. There’s more positive reports about Naka though with Strachan saying today he’s ‘getting better every day’.
If Jan’s definitely out then I wouldn’t make a straight swop by bringing in Chris Killen simply because he’s not ready for it yet. I’d tweak things somewhat and play a 5 man midfield with different midfield players, though mostly Brown and Donati, taking turns to support McDonald.
I’d go for:
Boruc;
Doumbe; Caldwell; McManus; Naylor;
Nakamura; Brown; Hartley; Donati; McGeady;
McDonald;
That midfield would be pretty fluent with Naka and Aiden also having licence to come infield and get on the ball.
Milan drew 1-1 at home to Catania today with Kaka equalising from the spot. Their league record is now 1 win, 4 draws and 1 defeat from 6 games having lost away to Palermo on Wednesday. They’re not in the best of form so it should be interesting.
The problem will be if Naka is out too. It’s a big ask to get Riordan to play wide in a 5 man midfield given his experience to date.
therock67 wrote:
The problem will be if Naka is out too. It’s a big ask to get Riordan to play wide in a 5 man midfield given his experience to date.
Exactly. I wouldn’t have Riordan near the team on Wednesday night. He can basically strike a ball sweetly but he’s built like a 12 year-old. Gattuso would hound him off every single ball. I’d play Sno in that case and rearrange the midfield.
Yeah that’s probably what I’d go for too.
Actually I’ve changed my mind.
If Naka isn’t fit I’d play
Boruc
Doumbe Caldwell McManus Naylor
McGeady Donati Hartley Brown
Magic McDonald
If Naka can play then I think I’d go for the 4-5-1.
Problem with Aiden playing on the right is he’ll be up against Jankulovski again.
Strachan is making a decision on Naka’s fitness today after monitoring his training and speaking to the medical staff. JVoH is definitely ruled out.
From The Evening Times:
Naka faces Milan test
by Ronnie Cully
SHUNSUKE NAKAMURA will discover today if he can play against AC Milan on Wednesday.
With Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink already ruled out after pulling a hamstring in Saturday’s 3-0 win over Dundee United, the presence of the Japanese maestro is even more important.
He worked hard in the Parkhead gym on Saturday, then reported back for a progress check on his damaged knee ligaments yesterday.
Now it’s decision time, and Naka said: "I am going into Celtic Park today to see if I can play on Wednesday.
“I have not really spoken to manager Gordon Strachan about this. But I will speak to the doctor and the physio to see what I can do.”
Naka is desperate to play having been bitterly disappointed when he aggravated the injury to his left knee during the 2-0 defeat in Donetsk a fortnight ago.
Scans indicated it would be two or three weeks before he could play again.
But the Japanese set-piece specialist has been pushing himself hard as he knows how important this game is to the club.
However, the player’s importance to the team is also uppermost in the mind of Strachan who is not prepared to take any risk which could see Nakamura ruled out for a longer period.
So, the manager will consult with his medical team today before a decision is taken.
Strachan does not want to upset his team’s preparation by waiting until the last minute as Nakamura is so integral to his set-piece plays.
And, in any case, any late withdrawal would leave very little time to redraw these plans.
The manager said: “I will definitely make up my mind on Shunsuke today,” having previously admitted he was “hopeful, because Naka is such an incredibly fit person.”
With Vennegoor facing a three-week lay off, Strachan will also make a decision on whether to include an extra midfield player and leave in-form Scott McDonald to forage alone up front on Wednesday - or to pitch Chris Killen in for his first European start for the club.
Maciej Zurawski is another possible contender for a start as his experience at this level - he has played 50 European games - would cancel out his lack or recent match time.
But, whoever is given the nod, Strachan will ensure they are the ones given his attention as he refuses to allow injury to others to cast a pall over the club at such a crucial time.
He said: "We will just get on with it.
“We have lost a lot of players over the last couple of weeks and we simply got on with it.”
Big Jan is a big loss. We’ll really miss his experience up there and playing at home it’s a shame to play 4-5-1.
We have the players to create chances though especially if Naka is fit.
Newsflash
“Naka Nakered for Milan test”
or
"“Celtic Nakered for Champions league clash”
:w00t: :w00t: :w00t: :w00t: :w00t:
Pre-match thoughts:
Always busy before a CL game I’m heading across to so I’ll keep this brief.
Firstly (and quite incredibly), RTE have chosen to show the game live instead of fawning over some English team or other and I nearly collapsed when I heard the news. Look out for Johnny ‘I only watch football if I’m getting paid to do so’ Giles coming out with his usual banal comments about Celtic: ‘I haven’t seen much of them Bill’, ‘They play in the Scottish league so they’ll be game and physical but they won’t have much quality Bill’ etc etc. Fortunately I’ll miss out on their blatant laziness and unprofessionalism.
Getting to the game; Milan will play their usual 4-3-2-1 and will attempt to get a grip on possession by crowding the midfield with what is a class collection of players. Vennegoor of Hesselink is definitely out, which in theory is quite a blow, but I would have gone 4-5-1/4-3-3 for this game irrespective of his fitness and I don’t see this as a negative move. Instead it will give us requisite numbers in midfield to compete and get a foothold and then we can break at pace through McGeady, Brown, Donati, Nakamura (hopefully) and McDonald.
It’s imperative that Naka’s fit after his injury in Donetsk as the majority of our best play comes through him. Reports over the past couple of days have been encouraging but Celtic under Strachan have been extremely coy when it comes to players’ fitness and he tends to leave out players unless they’re fully fit. I still retain strong hope that he’ll make it though.
In that case we’re looking at the following team:
Boruc;
Doumb; Caldwell; McManus; Naylor;
Nakamura; Brown; Hartley; Donati; McGeady;
McDonald;
Mark Wilson’s recurring knee problem is a shame but it’s best he goes and gets it operated on and sorted out once and for all. It was a shame to see such an excellent young player become so restricted and it was badly affecting his form. However, Joe Doumb was solid at Hibernian and excellent on Saturday so I’ve no qualms about him coming in. Lee Naylor’s form continues to be the major concern at the back.
If we play that midfield 5 then it’ll have a nice balance to it in terms of passing, pace, strength, tackling etc and it’s also very fluid in that Naka and Aiden can play on either side or drift into central positions and Brown and Donati can play on the right and left respectively. If we’re going to open them up then we’re going to have to pass the ball at pace and try to get our creative players into little pockets of space. This should be possible with our midfield interchanging and the 5 bhoys moving constantly. If Naka’s out then I’d bring in Sno, who was excellent in both Milan fixtures last season, and move Brown out to the right. Evander’s looked a little bit short of fitness so far this season though after injuring his knee against Ireland U-21s in May so he’ll need to up it considerably.
However, the one thing about Strachan in big games is that the side he selects is generally very hard to predict. There was a number of surprises throughout last season’s campaign so I wouldn’t be taken aback to see him do something completely different.
Milan come into the game with a league record of 1 win, 4 draws and a sole defeat at Palermo last midweek so they’re not in the best of form. The thing with such a quality side like them, whose emphasis is possibly more on Europe than their domestic league, is that the big European stage brings them up to another level. Sure we can beat them but we’re going to have to play out of our skins.
Good preview Bandage.
That’s certainly a strong midfield we have if Naka is fit. As you say it’s also very interchangeable with Naka and McGeady roaming inside and Brown and Donati drifting out wide.
I don’t think Sno is fit enough or sharp enough to play in a game of this magnitude. I like the guy but he hasn’t played much this season and he isn’t the most dynamic of players even when operating at 100%. As I’ve said previously Magic would be my second choice in the absence of Sno. I know he’s not much sharper than Sno but he has plenty to prove and played well in a couple of European games last year - at home to Benfica in particular he covered loads of ground tracking back and disrupting their passing through midfield.
The talk on Naka is positive but it’s impossible to know for certain. We remember the contrast last season when 50/50 players didn’t feature against O’Neill’s time when Sutton and Petrov in particular played with fairly restricitive injuries.
Who is Magic? Is that someones nickname or some bloke from the eastern block?
Flano wrote:
Who is Magic? Is that someones nickname or some bloke from the eastern block?
It’s both actually.
Maciej Zurawski = Magic Zurawski
Cheers for clearing that up. It’s something I had to ask because I’ve often seen it being used and wasnt quite sure who it was.
You’re possibly right on Magic there Rocko. I too rate Sno highly but he wasn’t sharp when he got a game against St Mirren and though he looked much fitter in the cup last week at Dundee it’s a huge step up to Milan. I’d need to think about it a bit because Magic has been largely anonymous this season and instead of working his balls off to force his way back into the side, he seems resigned and satisfied to be a bit part player coming off the bench.
Yeah that’s an issue alright but surely motivation for a CL game at home to Milan can’t be difficult. He has lacked confidence too which is probably a worse trait. I’d nearly consider Riordan (up front, not on the wing) and I’d certainly have him on the bench because if nothing else he’d be keen.