“A million miles away from the finished article” was Martin O’Neill’s assessment of this Celtic team after the globally humiliating defeat to LASK, from an almost impregnable position of strength.

A statement I think that has been too readily glossed over. If you consider it for more than a moment, you accept there was frustration and anger after the worst European result in the club’s history; that’s not in question. However, it was also a candid and devastating attack on the current strength of the squad and, by default, those that led us here.

I covered in my last blog what fault lay with the manager and players, who should have done better. However, we arrived here by either malign design or comprehensive incompetence. Such a result should absolutely not have been possible with the right squad. A squad we simply don’t have, and didn’t have last season either.

Since Martin’s initial tenure came to an end and Lawwellball was implemented in full, we have seen an unceasingly parsimonious approach to squad quality. That was initially necessary to keep us within our means at that time, as we established a sound financial footing. However, after our Govan rivals got their comeuppance from a decade of financial doping, ironically thanks to Her Majesty’s taxmen, there was an unexpected response from the Celtic boardroom.

As our ‘old firm’ partners slid into oblivion (no laughing at the back) CEO Peter Lawwell voiced his grief for the loss of £5m in income a year. As the fans have learned well in the last 13 years, accountants are great at cutting costs and increasing turnover for the PLC, but they have no vision for the progress of the team on the pitch.

Rather than see an opportunity for us to forge ahead and build solid foundations as European competitors, they saw only danger with their parochial and unreasonably conservative outlook.

Selling The Shirts

For us, the ‘product’ is the team on the pitch, in which we place our hopes and dreams. Expending an unhealthy amount of emotional energy, valuable time and precious funds. For them, the team is a peripheral inconvenience to the real’ product ’. An endless stream of merchandise sold at wildly inflated prices.

They relentlessly exploit the fans’ love for the club. Flogging pies, ties and cynical lies. As with the perpetual commoditisation of the Lions. In this 60^th anniversary year of our greatest achievement, they package the romance of our time as all-conquering masters of Europe, in the sure knowledge that it’s an achievement and era firmly and proudly embedded in the DNA of Celtic fans, even those many generations removed who never saw any of them play.

The cynical lie is in the implicit possibility of a world where we might stand tall once more among the European giants. Can we dominate as we once did? It would be foolish to think that could be the case. But must we constantly endure humiliation, most often inflicted by clubs that are financial pygmies compared to modern Celtic?

Worlds Apart

Our custodians cannot imagine a world where we could thrive with more ambitious (not reckless) expenditure on players, rather than a world where they sit smugly on their mountain of fan-extracted funds, refusing to spend that money so that we are not forced to hang our heads in shame, and sneer patronisingly at the discontent they have wrought with a risk aversion verging on clinical paranoia.

They are happy to manipulate our emotions to sell merchandise but are appalled that we might have reasonable expectations they should be delivering European progress.

I have repeatedly said on A Celtic State of Mind over the last four years that the chasm between the board and the fans is based on a fundamental difference in belief. For the vast majority of fans, European progress is foundational, not aspirational.

The board had told us many times with their actions, or lack thereof, that they believed it was very much aspirational, but we had never had verbal confirmation.

Which is why, for me, a particular low point of our last fractious and divisive season was the frankly outrageous and tone-deaf statement by the unofficial proxy for our self-styled owner.

As loath as I am to give further voice to this AGM-uttered nonsense, I also think it’s important in the wake of yet another ignominious outcome to understand the mentality embedded in this unchanged, stale and decades-old boardroom. A mentality that has taken such firm root that it’s now an almost religious ideology.

Ross Desmond stated:

“Those who talk about the club not having kicked on in Europe since 2003 ignore the enormous change in the management landscape of football in that period.

It has created a gap which keeps growing. It has created a gap which keeps growing and challenges any club to make us more European league. Most supporters understand that.

Of course, clubs can still punch above their financial weight and we should aspire to that. But if you swing and miss, you risk the very stability of the club and that would be profoundly irresponsible.”

I really don’t think that requires further analysis from me. It is offensive, contemptuous, deeply condescending and bears no relationship to the reality of our financial position and the achievements of smaller clubs who could only dream of our advantages.

Staying Ahead of the Dead

With plenty of available evidence, it is impossible to escape the conclusion that the old trope of ‘they just want to stay 1 point in front of The Rangers’ is based firmly in reality.

The problem being that The Rangers continue to implode. Despite throwing an astonishing amount of money at their new toy, the unknown investors from the depths of Delaware have been unable to fix what is broken. Having finished third last year from a commanding position, they have somehow now conspired to be bounced out of all three tiers of European competition, and there are already calls for yet another manager.

This should be hilarious ammunition for the banter years, but after last season’s skin-of-the-teeth victory and our own European hammering, I don’t much feel like laughing.

The fact that we should in any way continue to gauge our success against this basket case of an institution is indicative of an unforgivable dereliction of duty in our justifiably maligned boardroom.

We now face a challenging Europa Cup group with a clearly inadequate squad and mere days left to address our long-known deficiencies.

We must raise our ambitions to beyond our borders. Celtic fans deserve the romance and glory of competition and success among worthy European peers.

Not to be scrabbling for victory in a domestic league that will only ever be challenging because our board have chosen to make it so.