The Offical Glasgow Celtic thread

[SHEEDY]

celtic should have been the ones to offer a replay.

Eh ? Celtic aren't the lawmakers and the chances are that if they did something like this then they'd end up getting punished themselves. This has absolutely nothing to do with Celtic and legia are acting like kids. They messed up and were awarded a 0-3 result which ended up putting them out. UEFA will not want any precedents to be set - they administer the rules and not the clubs.

UEFA will never sanction a replay, rules are rules and all that. what I should have said was that celtic should have offered a replay, UEFA never would allow it, but celtic would have looked good out of it for at least offering a replay.

[Itchy]

Celtic should consult with Meath GAA on how yo do the right thing, basically just do the opposite to what Meath do!

[lynchbhoy]

I see the main sponsor/owner of legia has written an open letter to Celtic saying that if they had the high morals and standards that the club always allude to - then they should offer a winner takes all replay in Glasgow or warsaw.

I'd say no.
One - rules are rules and they are particularly stringent in soccer, plus as mentioned things like Thierry henris handball are not dealt with by myriads of committees as we have in the Gaa.

Two - Celtic need the money and a guarantee of at least Europa league participation

It would be risking financial suicide to offer a replay

[illdecide]

The right thing to do is give them their spot in qualifying round morally but I keep asking myself if the shoe was on the other foot how many teams would offer Celtic the tie or a reply...NONE. Football clubs are now run as a business and I'd imagine the board and shareholders wouldn't be happy if Peter Lawwell were to give it to Legia...just won't happen.

[StGallsGAA]

News just in!! Peter Lawwell has graciously offered a one leg play-off to the Legia Warsaw chairman - on fifa14...

[illdecide]

Celtic are a lucky bunch as the appeal from Legia Warsaw was rejected... Will they have enough to get past Maribor...going by last nights display and the way Legia disposed of us then you'd have to fancy the Slovenians but hopefully well get better as the weeks go by and scrape thru...

[stibhan]

The rumour is that even if Celtic stepped aside, UEFA would have just given Maribor a bye and left Legia in the Europa League. Meaning Celtic would be out of Europe altogether.

It's all well and good saying that Celtic should step aside, but the repercussions aren't clear.

[lenny]

Celtic are a lucky bunch as the appeal from Legia Warsaw was rejected... Will they have enough to get past Maribor...going by last nights display and the way Legia disposed of us then you'd have to fancy the Slovenians but hopefully well get better as the weeks go by and scrape thru...

As a celtic fan I would prefer us to play in the Europa league. It's much more suited to our level and our young players would develop. Some fans say we need to qualify for the champions league for the money but even if we qualified we wouldn't spend the money on players anyway so the europa league would give us more winnable games but still against decent quality opposition.

[Applesisapples]

Celtic are a lucky bunch as the appeal from Legia Warsaw was rejected... Will they have enough to get past Maribor...going by last nights display and the way Legia disposed of us then you'd have to fancy the Slovenians but hopefully well get better as the weeks go by and scrape thru...

As a celtic fan I would prefer us to play in the Europa league. It's much more suited to our level and our young players would develop. Some fans say we need to qualify for the champions league for the money but even if we qualified we wouldn't spend the money on players anyway so the europa league would give us more winnable games but still against decent quality opposition.

Spot on

[stibhan]

Celtic want to compete in the Champion's League simply because it will be better for them in the long run. It's all well and good saying that we should be playing in the Europa League but that badly affects our coefficient and we need to be thinking about that primarily.

The more Celtic compete in the CL, the more likely it is that Scotland will get at worst a bye into the playoff round, at best a group stage berth before the season begins. On top of this, the financial gap will widen between us and any other domestic competitors. Which is the most important thing to do before the zombies come back.

[illdecide]

Celtic want to compete in the Champion's League simply because it will be better for them in the long run. It's all well and good saying that we should be playing in the Europa League but that badly affects our coefficient and we need to be thinking about that primarily.

The more Celtic compete in the CL, the more likely it is that Scotland will get at worst a bye into the playoff round, at best a group stage berth before the season begins. On top of this, the financial gap will widen between us and any other domestic competitors. Which is the most important thing to do before the zombies come back.

Correct

[deiseach]

No one in their right mind would volunteer to undergo the torment of Thursday football if they could be playing on Tuesday/Wednesday instead.

[straightred]

Celtic want to compete in the Champion's League simply because it will be better for them in the long run. It's all well and good saying that we should be playing in the Europa League but that badly affects our coefficient and we need to be thinking about that primarily.

The more Celtic compete in the CL, the more likely it is that Scotland will get at worst a bye into the playoff round, at best a group stage berth before the season begins. On top of this, the financial gap will widen between us and any other domestic competitors. Which is the most important thing to do before the zombies come back.

Not this simple. There are various bonus points for progression but in general you get a 2 points for a win and 1 for a draw in both the CL and EL. Therefore you'd have to think that they'd have more of a chance to pick up points in the EL than the CL and thus increase the coefficient. See http://kassiesa.home.xs4all.nl/bert/uefa/calc.html What is far more damaging to Celtic is the fact that no other Scottish teams have qualified. All teams from a country count and the country number feeds into the club number but Celtic are operating on their own.

The perfect scenario is to get the money by going into the CL and then finish 3rd in the group and drop into the EL which they might have a chance of doing some damage in (not likely this season unless a few players come in quickly)

[Applesisapples]

Celtic want to compete in the Champion's League simply because it will be better for them in the long run. It's all well and good saying that we should be playing in the Europa League but that badly affects our coefficient and we need to be thinking about that primarily.

The more Celtic compete in the CL, the more likely it is that Scotland will get at worst a bye into the playoff round, at best a group stage berth before the season begins. On top of this, the financial gap will widen between us and any other domestic competitors. Which is the most important thing to do before the zombies come back.

Correct

That needs investment which is not there

[under the bar]

Celtic could have wiped out their estimated £15M debt by investing a fraction of that in transfers/wages to get through 1 CL qualifier tie.