No more international breaks until February
As much as I am looking forward to the Euros next summer I am glad to be getting back to domestic football for a longer period without break. I was in the ballot for the Euros. Umpteen games and tickets and I got nada. I got lucky at Euro 16 and ended up with Italy v Spain in the knock out rounds in Paris.
Hopefully all of our players return unijured. As much as we have a releatively strong starting XI for domestic purposes I do not think we are in a place to make wholesale changes without impacting our ability to play through packed defences.
I see Tillio already being linked with a loan away if he doesn't get into the first team squad. Our summer transfer windw was a shambles. Peter Lawell back and we are back to buying loads of £2M players and hoping we get a hit.
Meanwhile across the city the Rangers fans are saying the same things as when Beale came in - players look fitter, better tactics and structure, hasn't lost, players look more interested blah blah blah - it is still the same schedit players playing a style based around cross it into the box loads and loads of times.
December will be interesting. If Rangers come through that unscathed and still within 5 points or less then they are in a race - they have 9 games to play in Decmber and we have 8. We will lose points over the season but so will Rangers.
Anyway back to Celtic Park this Saturday. Enjoy your week
Back to Reality
posted on 24/11/23
The trouble is no manager has seen enough in King to throw him in with Goldson.
Which suggests he's been out performed by Souttar/Davies. Both reasonably good players imo so no shame there.
Just think he's wasting time now, he really needs a loan to another team in the league. Surely the likes of St Johnstone would play him. With a run of games hopefully we will see the talent emerge.
posted on 24/11/23
comment by RenegadeOF (U9457)
posted 18 hours, 30 minutes ago
Robbie Ure showing up really well for Anderlecht B in the Belgian second division. Will be interesting to see if Anderlecht give him a chance, they usually do give their kids a chance. With likes of Gilmour, Wilson, Mebude etc moving away, not giving players chances just going to continue to drive the best players away.
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If anyone has seen Robbie Ure play over the past couple of seasons they would have noticed one key issue - his finishing is actually pretty poor.
Any Celtic fans who were at the Parkhead B team OF game last season might remember Ure going through on goal 1 or 3 times and choking badly.
He was a decent enough player and may mature but like Dali Mebude before him - his finishing for a striker was nowhere near good enough.
Rory Wilson was the one that got away and Gers were desperate to keep him.
posted on 24/11/23
*2 or 3 times 😩
posted on 24/11/23
comment by Humble Hamish (U21959)
posted 2 hours, 16 minutes ago
comment by RenegadeOF (U9457)
posted 18 hours, 30 minutes ago
Robbie Ure showing up really well for Anderlecht B in the Belgian second division. Will be interesting to see if Anderlecht give him a chance, they usually do give their kids a chance. With likes of Gilmour, Wilson, Mebude etc moving away, not giving players chances just going to continue to drive the best players away.
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If anyone has seen Robbie Ure play over the past couple of seasons they would have noticed one key issue - his finishing is actually pretty poor.
Any Celtic fans who were at the Parkhead B team OF game last season might remember Ure going through on goal 1 or 3 times and choking badly.
He was a decent enough player and may mature but like Dali Mebude before him - his finishing for a striker was nowhere near good enough.
Rory Wilson was the one that got away and Gers were desperate to keep him.
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Know consistency was an issue for him, but struggle to think he could be any worse than Dessers. Very low bar to be fair, and think Ure needed a move/loan but was more the point that he has gone elsewhere and is doing well, so what are our better youngsters going to think.
Was the younger Mebude I was meaning, who also turned down a contract with us to move to City
Point wasn’t actually on the quality of specific players - was that our best youngsters aren’t offered a chance when they do stay, so why would the next Wilson/Mebude stay. There going to see quite clearly it’s better to move.
posted on 24/11/23
Gilmour and Wilson would deffo have been given a chance imo. The club were desperate for them to stay. They fancied making more money in the short term and trying their luck at good clubs in a far far better league.
If the kids stick around and aren’t up to scratch at Rangers then best they can probably hope for is a Kilmarnock (Lewis Mayo) but more likely it’s going to be the Scottish league 1/championship or worse - see Kai Kennedy at National League York City or Josh McPake who is without a club four years after winning Academy POTY.
If you don’t make it at a prem club down south chances are they will still get a pop at the English championship. And they will earn more there than at any other Scottish club bar Rangers and Celtic.
There is still a big question mark for me whether or not Billy Gilmour is just another Barry Bannan. He still hasn’t fully established himself at a level yet imo.
posted on 24/11/23
Don’t see how there can be any confidence Gilmour would have got a chance for us. Wilson the same. Absolutely nothing to back up that view.
King was talked about and had offers from down South when he was 16. Being thrown in to the champions league at 18 next to James Sands isn’t what I’d call a chance.
Lovelace got a chance purely because we’d been playing terribly and think it was when Davis took over. He’d already had appearances for Millwall two seasons ago, granted they were minimal but still.
They’ve not been fancied, but only way they’re going to develop and be good enough is by being given chances.
posted on 24/11/23
Perhaps a problem is that our support is not exactly renowned for its patience with any player that makes a mistake or two
posted on 25/11/23
Players in the B team are continuously assessed and categorised internally. Guys like Gilmour, Wilson, Lovelace would all have been category A players.
Like so many others in recent years - Alex Lowry, Nathan Patterson, Josh McPake, Kai Kennedy, Dapo Mebude etc they would have a development path associated with their ranking. They would have been at the front of the queue when the first team needs bodies to train with. And there would have been a plan to get them a taste of first team action.
Gilmour and Wilson were probably the two top rated category A players of their age group at Rangers. The club were actively wooing them and their families in order to convince them to sign deals. Part of that discussion will without doubt have been about their accelerated path to the first team.
They would without doubt have got a chance to train with and play in the first team at a very early age just as every other player I have named here did.
When it gets to that point, of course they will continue to be supported and developed by the club but there comes a point where it’s up to them.
Nathan Patterson and James Maxwell both got their first team chance around the same time and were similarly ranked. Patterson plays in the EPL and is a Scotland squad regular, Maxwell plays with Doncaster.
Rangers can’t afford to give these kids 20-30 first team games to adjust to playing first team football. I agree it’s harsh but it’s life at a big club that has to win every game. They need to show pretty quickly when it comes to the crunch that they really want it and are good enough.
The kids need to show enough in the B team to get their chance training with the first team then show enough there to earn the managers trust. If they get chances in the first team they need to take it.
If they don’t look ready at that point then they will more often than not get a loan. The club facilitates this loan and monitors them closely- but they are expected to shine never mind play regularly. Guys like McPake, Kennedy, Cole McKinnon etc did ok at times on loan but not enough to convince anyone they were close to being ready for rangers first team.
Producing players capable of stepping directly from the B team to Rangers first team is a heck of a challenge. Celtic don’t find it easy and neither do we.
McCausland was always highly rated in the B team but so far he has excelled since he came in. There is an expectation level now for him so he needs to maintain his early form. He has shown he has the mentality and drive to play for the first team - he also needs to be able to show he can cope when tough times come around.
posted on 25/11/23
Disagree completely. McAusland has came in and been possibly our best player in last two appearances, one as a sub and one as a starter. He shouldn’t have to maintain that level, simply isn’t going to happen. Needs to be an acceptance of inconsistency. I mean it’s accepted to an extent for most wingers at our level regardless of age.
Similarly, Lowry was MOTM possibly in his first 3 or 2/3 games then completely dropped, and wasn’t even making sub appearances. When the form drops we should be continually looking to build up their confidence and form from the bench. Think the loan makes absolute sense for Lowry right now, and think he should maybe even stay another year if he nails down a spot.
If players come in and show they can perform at a high level, there should be more patience. Not about every player getting 20 to 30 games, and some won’t show that high level or simply won’t develop till later but if there’s no patience with young players and no one getting a real chance then the best young players are going to continue to leave.
King was category A as well by the way. and deserves a proper chance for me given how he has excelled in some games he’s played, especially when the centre backs playing next to Goldson arent at the level we want. Think in some ways at his age it’d be easier to give him a chance for us now with Goldson next to him as would be to go out to a team like St Mirren and jump into their first team given the style of play. A loan abroad to a Dutch or Austrian team I’d think would be better though if he was.
Thought they might have binned the categories very recently for some reason, but I might have just not heard about it for a while. Clement mentioned a youth player potentially playing tomorrow in midfield, would assume it’s King of Bailey. Which is positive if so.
If we had first team players that were performing that highly consistency I’d agree with the view there’s no patience. But they aren’t, and simply looking at the accounts the expenses we are running at simply aren’t sustainable, something needs to change.
posted on 25/11/23
Your last paragraph certainly hits a nail on the head. If the team is preforming well and winning then its easy to bring young players on for 30 mins or so. Throwing them in in European ties out of necessity when we are struggling is almost guaranteed to set them back.