It was August 2012, and I was in Philadelphia.
Funnily enough, so was my team Celtic.
The Hoops were there to play Real Madrid in a friendly and I was there to see them.
The team was staying in the Hyatt Hotel in the city of brotherly love, and I was invited there to a breakfast with some Philly Tims.
It was the summer of this momentous event on Planet Fitba.
Consequently, the mood among the Hoops fans was rather upbeat.
As I was leaving the hotel, I spotted Celtic’s omnipotent CEO speaking to a Philadelphia based Celtic supporter who I really needed to speak with about an upcoming event at the City’s Famine memorial.
Mr Lawwell spotted me approaching, and it appeared to give him something of a start.
“Phil, are you here working?” he asked me.
At that moment, just outside the main door of the hotel, some fans were dancing with a cardboard coffin with “RFC” on it.
Looking at this happy scene, Mr Lawwell said to me, “this has cost us five million pounds”.
His unscripted response to me revealed the importance of the “Old Firm” brand to the folks taking the major decisions at Celtic.
Ironically the venue for the match was the Lincoln Financial Field.
That summer, it was just becoming apparent that for a decade, that playing field in Scotland was anything but level.
In the end, it was all about the financial. The EBT scam had allowed David Murray’s Rangers to have a vastly inflated football budget. In order to operate that scheme, their players had to be…ahem…“imperfectly registered”.
Hiding in plain sight, the EBT thing was operated for the first decade of the new millennium, because of a lack of oversight at Hampden and the venal, craven obedience of the Stenography Corps.
It was the sort of thing that would have had the Bunnet going to law.
After all, the wee man was willing to put Farry’s head on a spike for delaying the registration of a single player!
Some folks in the years since 2012 have pointed out to me that the Parkhead club was about a process of “managed decline” as Celtic awaited the return of their Old Firm partners.
That they needed a Rangers, any Rangers, to build the business.
Of course, that was at variance with the official narrative that would be trotted out at the club’s stag managed AGMs. I was in the room when the Rory Bremner quip was delivered.
What I did NOT know that day in Philadelphia was that the previous year the Celtic CEO had been in close dialogue with the Rangers Managing Director Martin Bain about how both clubs would pitch the Old Firm as a package to the English football authorities.
I have since seen excerpts from that correspondence, and it is quite clear that these were not rivals but closely aligned business partners.
For Mr Desmond Celtic, being admitted into the promised land of the EPL would be the sporting equivalent of his brilliant bit of business on the London City Airport.
Overnight Celtic in the English topflight would massively increase the value of his shareholding in the Parkhead club overnight.
The instructions to the Celtic CEO in the meantime was to keep the operation ticking over. With the disappearance of Rangers in 2012, it was time to run down the operation and wait for the reappearance of that brand.
Hence the term “managed decline”.
Well, today, the process is now complete.
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Typical of Liewell’s small time outlook. Worrying about losing £5m with the demise of ‘Rangers’ but then allowing Celtic to piss away £150m in prize money by only reaching the CL group stage twice in seven attempt.
New manager has a massive rebuild job on his hands.
Fergus or affectionately named as “the bunnet” wouldn’t have put 2 bob into Celtic if the huns never existed,or if the gap in finances in English football and Scottish was as big as it it is currently.
Remember DD contributed loads of his 50 million pay off by buying worthless shares.
When Mccann left the huns had just won a treble.
we will be back on top next year, there is always another day
TIOCFAIDH AR LA
I can’t believe I’d see our club come off the rails like this , been heading this way for a couple of years . This seasons title is simply a must win , no other way or it’s gonna be like the 90’s . I just so hope for our sanity that Mr DD has a proper plan in place …….
This whole affair is shocking, how dare they treat Supporters thus?
Hi , we can only hope Mr Desmond sees what needs done and fixes it fast.
Our club is in a spin , but exciting times ahead I’m sure
The guys running the club never ever got it, only the fans know what this feels like. Supporters of my age (60+), have taken an almighty blow with the failure to get the ten. A lot of us won’t survive to see any future attempt to accomplish what was easily within our grasp. I can’t sum this up in any words that may be found in any word mines Phil.
It’s plain to see the Celtic board are totally diconected with the fan base who want justice seen to be done with sevco and all we ask is the truth be told about the continuation myth.
I just don’t see , even with a new CEO that anything will change.
The only way I can see to change this is a total boycott of season tickets and merchandise till the board take the fans views into consideration.
Enjoying the squad by the way, thought it might be a bit anti British for me , but no , looking forward to the sequel.