I know Celtic played today but Iāve a couple of points to make:
Scott Brown failed in his appeal to have his 3-match Champions League suspension reduced so heāll miss Ajax away next week and then Milan at home towards the end of the month. His Champions League group campaign has consisted of giving away a stupid foul for Milanās second goal, a red card against Barcelona, suspended, suspended, suspended and back for the last game away to Barca. Not pretty reading.
Ajax havenāt reacted well to the defeat last week. They had a scoreless draw at home to joint bottom RKC Waalwijk last weekend and were beaten 1-0 at home to Vitesse Arnhem this evening. Their manager and many of their players have given interviews saying they didnāt deserve to lose in Glasgow, were the better team etc etc. Hopefully theyāll be overly anxious and too hyped when trying to put us in our place and we can pick them off.
That leads me on to Milan. Iām watching them at home to Fiorentina here and theyāre absolutely hopeless. Obviously we didnāt deserve to lose in Milan but weāll surely defeat them in Glasgow to go through after the win in Amsterdam. They still look ragged and unsettled at the back. The only constant in their defence is Kevin - they also have Abate, Zacardo and Zapata playing tonight. De Jong and Muntari have been particularly bad in midfield and theyāre not offering much threat upfront at all.
Are the crowds down at Parkhead this season? There seemed to be a shitload of empty seats there today, noticed the same thing during another recent SPL game.
Season ticket sales are slightly up I think. Attendances can be quite weather dependent and there would be a decrease in Irish travellers in the week before European games, not many can afford to go on a Saturday and during the week. Iād say attendances are fairly consistent with the last couple of years, but theyāve fallen off since the OāNeill era.
Donāt think thereās been a major decline this season but attendances have fallen compared to a decade or so ago alright. Celtic count sold season tickets in attendance figures even if theyāre unused too so the attendance announced is probably higher than the actual amount of people in the stadium for all games. It was pissing rain today so the seats near the front seemed to be vacated by people heading back up for shelter. Various reasons for attendance falling - recession, demise of former main rival / lack of meaningful competition, lack of genuine Larsson type world class players, style of football / value for money, over zealous policing / stewarding.
Weāre apparently close to signing an Icelandic u-21 striker in January and Lawwell reckons we could sign a Chinese midfielder called Xhang Zizhe next summer.
In other news, I can exclusively reveal that Fram have accepted a GBPĀ£100k bid from Celtic for Holmbert Aron Fridjonsson. The Icelandic U21 striker is travelling to Glasgow to discuss personal terms. If we complete it, The Fridge will join in January.
[quote=āBandage, post: 860065, member: 9ā]Weāll do well to hold onto him for 2 seasons.
In other news, I can exclusively reveal that Fram have accepted a GBPĀ£100k bid from Celtic for Holmbert Aron Fridjonsson. The Icelandic U21 striker is travelling to Glasgow to discuss personal terms. If we complete it, The Fridge will join in January.[/quote]
