League Cup Final 🏆 Celtic v St Mirren

Sport
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Standing in the game is also a thing.

Gordon Strachan was a famous footballer who had won a European Cup Winners Cup and Scottish domestic trophies to beat the band and played for Manchester United and won the FA Cup and captained Leeds United to win the First Division title. He had managed Southampton to the FA Cup final. Nobody needed to ask “who are you?”

Brendan Rodgers lost his first game to Lincoln Red Imps of Gibraltar. But he had the fall back of having been the Liverpool manager who had come by far the closest to winning the Premier League two years previously. Nobody needed to ask who he was.

Some of the players might have needed to ask who Wim Jansen was, but Wim could tell them he had beaten Celtic in a European Cup final and played for Johan Cruyff’s Holland team in a World Cup final.

A lot of the players might have needed to ask who Ange was, but Ange could at least tell them he’d managed in the World Cup finals. Ange didn’t have the same disastrous start Nancy has had, and Ange’s personality immediately seemed a far better fit. People weren’t at all sure about Ange initially, but they soon enough came around because of that personality. He showed very quickly he “got” Celtic.

Martin O’Neill’s standing and his personality which could justify that standing was everything in his recent success.

All the players had to ask who Wilfried Nancy was. The initial gut feeling when he came in was that he did not “get” Celtic. He is an obvious ideologue and his ideology is failing.

We’ve already had the tactics board meme, we’ve already had the “I’m interested in performances rather than results” meme, we’ve already had Evan Ferguson say “their players didn’t know what they were doing”, today we had Nancy running along the line chasing after the play and shouting. That might look alright if you’re winning, if you’re losing it’s more optical poison.

He speaks in a very exaggerated French accent, almost Clouseauesque. Is it fair that that becomes a meme? Probably not, but it does, the same as Bob Bradley saying “sawker” became a meme.

Ronny Deila had a lot of the same problems. The perception was “Who is he? He seems like an ideologue” which became “he seems like a spoofer and he’s out of his depth personality wise”.

If you’re a nobody, and Deila and Nancy were nobodies, you’ve got to make your mark very quickly so that you become a somebody. Ange was able to do that but the first impressions of Nancy are already fatal for him.

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Winning Mickey Mouse leagues is his speciality

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Andy Robertson will have some job dealing with this rabble next season.

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84

Nancy Out
The Board Out
Brits Out

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85

For someone who was sailing & railing home to Ireland during the match (cc Holidays for the accompanied traveller thread) with no phone connection, is it worth watching the match as a Celtic fan in a macabre kind of way?

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Would you not just text what @Rocko thought and then post it up later.

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Completely forgot Jonah Ayunga played with Galway United for a week. I speak for all of us LOI thread regulars in wishing him a fantastic evening of celebrations in Paisley.

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88

Just doing some research, Celtics new mangers last job was in the MLS……. wtf….

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89

Needs to bring in some Chads in the January window to play alongside Celtics assortment of ageing Scottish Internationals who can play a bit and the Japenese school children who I think play in the forwards. (I don’t know where they play, they just seem to run around).

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Not just in MLS mate, but some cornfield in the middle of bumfuck Ohio. T’would be like Offaly co board appointing some fella whose last gig was managing some junior B team in Donegal to manage the hurlers.

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Sounds like a boyband. A really bad one.

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Bhoyzone
WestOfScotlandLife
The Bhoy City Rollers
Nan’cync
5ive (defeats in a row)

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Rollovers !

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Emotions running high

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96

But the MLS is probably a higher standard than the SPL. The SPL doesn’t have footballers with the ability of Messi or Suarez in its ranks.

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Like saying Galway were the best team in a decade because they had joe canning and daithi burke.

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MLS in 10th, the SPL way down in 33rd so my point stands.

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I read in some recent article, the source of which I helpfully can’t remember, which was saying Opta or one of those football analytics sorts, which I helpfully can’t remember for certain, rates the MLS 10th strongest league in the world with the SP(F)L languishing in the late 20s.

Again, it’s one of those contradictions of the Nancy appointment. I get that the average MLS side is stronger than the average Scottish side. There’s also the meritocracy system with salary caps & limits on Designated Players to make it a more level playing field & thus it’s harder for a manager to bestride the league with a very high win percentage. But that in turn probably means there isn’t that expectation, even demand/requirement, to win every domestic game like you get at a club like Celtic.

There’s also the play-off system, which feeds into that…along with the size of the country & travel involved…so teams can prioritise games & effectively not be bothered about some of them (as you see in European club rubby & the GGA leagues these days). They know they can qualify for the play offs by coming 7th or something in their Conference with a 12-9-7 record or the likes.

Of course, you can’t really argue with a coach wanting to implement principles & having full belief in his philosophy & talking about getting the process right as that will lead to positive performances & ultimately results…but in Glasgow, in Scotland, you have to win first & foremost.

Edit: I see our posts crossed @Aertel220 re league strength.

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MLS is not a serious league, it’s a Disney league.

It doesn’t have relegation and there isn’t much riding on your average league match as 18 of the 30 teams qualify for the play-offs.

The whole football culture there is much less demanding. Glasgow is a proper cut throat football culture, occasionally literally.

I’m quite sure Nancy had no real idea of what he was letting himself in for. He looks like an under 14 player chucked in at senior.