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Celtic in Europe 2018-19, the long and winding road


senorsoupe

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I find that pretty depressing to be honest - in Scottish Football terms, that's a disruptive amount of money and it will do nothing healthy for the game here - this is entirely negative IMO. For Celtic to consistently qualify for the CL groups is a really good achievement but that reward is simply disproportionate.

I've said in the past that a one horse race in the league doesn't feel much different to the traditional 2 horse race when you've got no chance of winning it and so it doesn't bother me - but the risk is that we are moving from a period where over the past few years loads of clubs have won something (AKA Armageddon) to an utterly stale situation that Celtic are going to hoover up everything domestically as the gap in resources is now becoming comically wide - and at a scale that has never happened before.

Given that the CL was explicitly designed (ironically by a Rangers Director) to entrench the wealth and eminence of a relative handful of clubs and has now done so all over europe, the inescapable logic is that Celtic will need to soon move into whatever "european league" structure is invented (even if it would likely be in the 2nd tier of such a thing) - as they aren't going to "belong" in our league.

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53 minutes ago, Swello said:

I find that pretty depressing to be honest - in Scottish Football terms, that's a disruptive amount of money and it will do nothing healthy for the game here - this is entirely negative IMO. For Celtic to consistently qualify for the CL groups is a really good achievement but that reward is simply disproportionate.

I've said in the past that a one horse race in the league doesn't feel much different to the traditional 2 horse race when you've got no chance of winning it and so it doesn't bother me - but the risk is that we are moving from a period where over the past few years loads of clubs have won something (AKA Armageddon) to an utterly stale situation that Celtic are going to hoover up everything domestically as the gap in resources is now becoming comically wide - and at a scale that has never happened before.

Given that the CL was explicitly designed (ironically by a Rangers Director) to entrench the wealth and eminence of a relative handful of clubs and has now done so all over europe, the inescapable logic is that Celtic will need to soon move into whatever "european league" structure is invented (even if it would likely be in the 2nd tier of such a thing) - as they aren't going to "belong" in our league.

Seems a natural evolution at this point for something along those lines to come in. Aside from the fact that the CL is largely the same teams every year anyway, there is the effect of the qualifying cash as you mention, on the diddy leagues where one team does qualify. That said, I think Celtic will struggle this year. They are generally somewhere between a 1/2 to 1/3 team in terms of qualifying, and having done it the last 2 seasons it is probably their turn to miss out. Making the EL Group stages is nothing like as lucrative, but even at that it would still mean something in the region of £10m after all is said and done. Not quite as much but still keeping them out of reach of the rest.

Regards your second paragraph. The best thing that happened in the Scottish game was Rangers going tits up. With no rival, Celtic clearly lost something and it saw the cups shared a lot more than previously. Rangers hitting the top league but being pish seems to be the ideal set up for Celtic. The presence of a supposed rival has them on their toes but the lack of real competition has seen them dominate domestically on a previously unseen level. Will be interesting to see if they keep up that level of results in the cups next season.

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On 6/6/2018 at 05:27, Ross. said:

That said, I think Celtic will struggle this year. They are generally somewhere between a 1/2 to 1/3 team in terms of qualifying, and having done it the last 2 seasons it is probably their turn to miss out. Making the EL Group stages is nothing like as lucrative, but even at that it would still mean something in the region of £10m after all is said and done. Not quite as much but still keeping them out of reach of the rest.

Being seeded for all of the stages will be a big advantage for Celtic, but there are still some really tough draws out there that will be unseeded such as Midtjylland, Red Star Belgrade, AEK Athens etc... so I agree it will be tougher than previous seasons.  In saying that I am cautiously optimistic that Celtic can get into the Champions League groups stage again. 

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1 hour ago, senorsoupe said:

Being seeded for all of the stages will be a big advantage for Celtic, but there are still some really tough draws out there that will be unseeded such as Midtjylland, Red Star Belgrade, AEK Athens etc... so I agree it will be tougher than previous seasons.  In saying that I am cautiously optimistic that Celtic can get into the Champions League groups stage again. 

Having a squad that have qualified in the last 2 seasons is an advantage,no team in the draw will want Celtic, Q1 and Q2  should be no problem,nail biting for the next two.
Looking at the world cup squads Celtic seem to be more effected than most Red Star Belgrade have a few going plus Legia Warsaw.

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10 hours ago, senorsoupe said:

Being seeded for all of the stages will be a big advantage for Celtic, but there are still some really tough draws out there that will be unseeded such as Midtjylland, Red Star Belgrade, AEK Athens etc... so I agree it will be tougher than previous seasons.  In saying that I am cautiously optimistic that Celtic can get into the Champions League groups stage again. 

The additional qualifying round will be a hell of a task. Essentially now two ties that are against opposition of a similar quality rather than just the one. With a bit of luck in the draw they will be OK but it will take a much bigger effort than previous years.

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Draw for Champions League Prelim round has been made, these are sigle games, 4 teams down to 1

Santa Coloma (AND) 2.75 vs. Drita (KOS) 0.00

La Fiorita (SNM) 1.75 vs. Lincoln Red Imps (GIB) 2.75

Winner of this mini-tournament goes into the hat with Celtic

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36 minutes ago, senorsoupe said:

Draw for Champions League Prelim round has been made, these are sigle games, 4 teams down to 1

Santa Coloma (AND) 2.75 vs. Drita (KOS) 0.00

La Fiorita (SNM) 1.75 vs. Lincoln Red Imps (GIB) 2.75

Winner of this mini-tournament goes into the hat with Celtic

I for one am wet with excitement to find out who'll be in there. 

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29 minutes ago, The OP said:

I for one am wet with excitement to find out who'll be in there. 

This is the kind of thing I pay attention to when there is no football on.  Once the world cup starts I'll be paying significantly less attention to this sort of thing!

Meanwhile, Ejani në Drita!!

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3 hours ago, senorsoupe said:

This is the kind of thing I pay attention to when there is no football on.  Once the world cup starts I'll be paying significantly less attention to this sort of thing!

Meanwhile, Ejani në Drita!!

I do enjoy looking at who we might get tbf but it doesn’t extend to the four teams in the pre first round round.

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So it's Alashkert of Armenia.  

Plusses, the Armenian league is not well ranked, 45th, one place above Luxembourg (and their teams never beat anyone in Europe) and two places above Northern Ireland (whose champs we beat comfortably despite their fans best efforts to take out our players with Buckfast bottles) so it theoretically should be straightforward.  Also the Armenian league runs August to May like the Scottish league so they won't be in mid-season form.  

Minuses, Armenia is really far from Glasgow, and very hot  Maybe St. Johnstone fans can provide travelling advice

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4 hours ago, Honest Saints Fan said:

Its not dodgy at all. Lovely city. Very friendly and cheap. Fucking roasting though. That stadium is the hottest place I've ever been. Think it was 38 degrees pitchside when we played there.

Thanks, I edited my post!  I was just going by reports but if you have been there I trust you!

If Celtic win that tie we play Valur or Rosenborg.  Assuming it's Rosenborg that will be a much trickier tie as they will be in mid-season form

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Alaskert will prove too strong for Celtic. They beat St Johnstone 1-0 three years ago, and only lost the away leg 2-1, so have real European pedigree.

No offence to the Henmans, but the best result for Scottish football is an Alaskert win. Our game is already massively one sided, without UEFA throwing another £20m at Celtic.

 

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On 19/06/2018 at 18:03, The OP said:

Trip to Asia and then probably Rosenborg again. Getting awfy familiar these qualifiers, not in a good way.

Probably best it being familiar as its our only real chance of qualifying for the CL. 

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12 minutes ago, paddymcp said:

Probably best it being familiar as its our only real chance of qualifying for the CL. 

Not sure about that, there were easier draws in both rounds. 

Unless you mean it’s our only chance of qualifying for the CL full stop - well that’s obvious because Scotland only get one team in and that team has to start almost as early as possible.

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3 minutes ago, The OP said:

Not sure about that, there were easier draws in both rounds. 

Unless you mean it’s our only chance of qualifying for the CL full stop - well that’s obvious because Scotland only get one team in and that team has to start almost as early as possible.

We would have no chance if it was an open draw to qualify for the CL like in years gone by so for as long as we keep playing these teams it means the Champions Route still exists  which means our budget dwarfs the sides we always face which means we 'should' expect to qualify which perpetuates the dominance $.
Familiarity doesnt breed contempt sometimes.

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1 minute ago, paddymcp said:

We would have no chance if it was an open draw to qualify for the CL like in years gone by so for as long as we keep playing these teams it means the Champions Route still exists  which means our budget dwarfs the sides we always face which means we 'should' expect to qualify which perpetuates the dominance $.
Familiarity doesnt breed contempt sometimes.

In 03-04 we faced a Lithuanian side and a Hungarian side, in 04-05 we went straight into the group stage, in 05-06 we faced a Slovakian side (tbf we lost 5-0 in the first leg) and 06-07 we went straight into the group stage.

Wasn’t always Ajax, Basel or Spartak Moscow in them days.

 

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