It’s too easy to put the boot into Scottish football
IT may seem like old hat, what with his studies in neurolinguistic programming and use of sports psychology, but this might be a nice week for Brendan Rodgers to start a scrapbook. If it makes it easier, a little more of the now, it could be a digital one.
You know, some MP3 files to play to his players and staff. The occasional article or tweet to consider in private or as a group.
Just in case they come in handy some time. Like when Celtic land another English club in Europe.
In the wake of Monday’s 3-1 loss at Leicester, Liverpool’s current manager Jurgen Klopp possessed the same record Rodgers did at Anfield after 56 league games.
Headlines such as: Are they actually worse under Jurgen Klopp than Brendan Rodgers? and Is Klopp turning into Rodgers at
Liverpool? have been running down south for weeks now.
You would think Rodgers had got the Anfield club relegated and pawned off the trophy room before he left.
Yes, his last 18 months were grim. However, he did take Liverpool to within an ace — or, rather, a Steven Gerrard slip — of winning the league in 2014. What would Klopp, or The Kop, give for that now?
The thing is, the dismissive remarks have spread to Rodgers’ achievements at his new club and the game here, in general.
We do not need to be told that Scottish football has had better days. Our television revenue is chickenfeed, there is no real competition. Rangers pressing the reset button on a chaotic campaign hardly helps. Harsh analysis is perfectly valid.
Analysis can be tiresome, though. It might involve five minutes on your mobile. Or talking to a researcher who has spent five minutes on his or her mobile. It disrupts the ‘bantz’ with those other geezers on the radio.
Rodgers’ thoughts on talk SPORT pundit Jason Cundy — who reckons Stoke have a greater global fan base than Celtic based on their number of Twitter followers — are clear.
This is the media outlet which recently ran a thundering opinion piece on its website, stating that the exit of Mark Warburton from Rangers proved we had ‘lost the plot’ up here in Bonnie Jockoland.
This tour de force concluded: ‘Warburton has become a unique figure in Scottish football history. He is the only manager whose success transformed both Rangers and Celtic.’
Their Friday night broadcast responding to Rodgers was another collectors’ item.
Cundy admitted he was spiteful and indulging in stereotypes when stating there was nothing other than beer and football in Glasgow — before insisting Celtic was merely a ‘stepping stone’ for Rodgers, getting smaller every year and living in a ‘bubble’.
Living in a bubble is certainly something he, in keeping with the whole of English football, need not do any research on.
One broadsheet newspaper invited clicks on a feature looking at Celtic’s dominance through its Twitter feed on Friday with the line: Is there any point in the Scottish Premiership? What else would they suggest? A
change of focus to caber tossing? Our teams need somewhere to play, with their English counterparts unwilling to allow them into their set-up for fear of what might happen.
Anyway, let’s hope similar effort is being expended on the natural follow-up: What is the point of the English Premier League?
It does generate oodles of cash. Particularly for humdrum foreign players, their agents and their selling clubs abroad. Only five of its clubs — Spurs, Stoke, Burnley, Middlesbrough and West Ham — remain in British hands.
In terms of revenue, last calculated at £3.4 billion, it is easily the richest competition in football. In Deloitte’s Money League, its clubs fill five of the top 10 places, eight of the top 20.
What does all that translate into, though? Scotland’s weaknesses are often measured through results in Europe and Celtic’s progress under Rodgers will be gauged the same way.
What do recent European campaigns say about English football? Arsenal are on their way out of the Champions League and Leicester and Manchester City — who could not beat Celtic in two group games — will have their work cut out to ensure English involvement in the quarter-finals.
Last season, City made the semifinals, but Arsenal and Chelsea bowed out in the last 16, with Manchester United failing to make the knockout stages at all.
In 2014-15, they had no one in the quarter-finals. Only one team in the last eight the year before. In 201213, Arsenal were England’s lone representatives in the last 16 and went no further.
No wonder BT Sport and Sky are showing a certain reluctance during the latest auction of Champions League rights. By the time it gets to the good bit, English clubs have shot their bolt.
It is little better in the Europa League. Chelsea are the only English winners in 15 years. This season, Manchester United are the sole English club in the last 16.
Still, at least the Premier League is filtering so much cash to grassroots level and producing a real conveyor belt of talent for the England national team, isn’t it?
The question seems valid. Other than raking in money, what is English football good for? Providing cannon fodder for UEFA competitions, clearly.
It is why that motivational scrapbook is a good idea. Should Celtic draw one of their clubs again, it may just stop complacency creeping in.