THERE is a line in 'The Celtic Song': "If you know their history"; well, some present-day commentators, indeed, I would venture to suggest, some of the more-hysterical members of 'The Celtic Family', perhaps need to open a football history book.
By any standards, Celtic has a long history of enjoying success, however, for all their impressive haul of 46 Scottish League titles, this equates to a success rate of 39%. Their 36 Scottish Cup wins equates to a success rate of 31%, while their League Cup success rate is a tad under 22%. Overall, Celtic have won slightly over 32% of the domestic competitions they have contested.
If we restrict our examination of how successful Celtic have been, since the current top league schedule of 38 games per season came in in season 2000-01, they have enjoyed a 71% success rate; their success rate in the other two competitions: the Scottish Cup and the League Cup (I take no congnisance of the different names and title sponsors of each competition over that time), we find success rates of just under 43% in the Scottish Cup and 28% in the League Cup, giving them a success rate in this century of just under 48%.
If we confine our examination of the club's success to the three full seasons since Rangers were liquidated and the Rangers Tribute Act surfaced in the lowest tier of Scottish senior football, well, for all the huge advantages the club enjoys in terms of financial clout, they have managed to win only 55.5% of the domestic trophies available to them.
In sport, being ranked Number One in any sport or competition is no guarantee of success. Novak Djokovic doesn't win every tennis tournament, or Rory McIlroy every golf event. Lewis Hamilton is not guaranteed to win every Formula One grand prix, or even Usain Bolt every 100-metres race. So, why is it a shock when a Celtic squad, which by the standards of those who went before, does not cruise to a Treble every year, or have the SPFL title wrapped-up by now?
Celtic might be "struggling" to impose themselves on the SPFL, but, they remain top of the table, albeit by a lesser margin than some might have expected there to be at this stage of the season. So, why the calls for manager Ronnie Deila's head?
Right, I accept he is not perhaps a Stein, Busby, Shankly or Ferguson - the Fab Four of Scottish football managers, or even a Willie Maley or a Bill Struth, the fabled Old Firm bosses from the Dark Ages, before wall-to-wall football on television. However, he led his club to a "Double" last season, and remains on-course for another this campaign.
I would reckon, these hysterical calls for Ronnie's head are simply yet another manifestation of the modern media's desperate need for controversy and conflict. Too-often today's media builds-up people into something wonderful, just-so, it seems to me, they can cut them down and sell papers on the back of this.
Celtic FC has no God-given right to win every match, every League Championship, every running of the Scottish Cup, or the League Cup. To expect this level of success is unreasonable, and, to call for the manager's head when the team proves less than all-conquering, is so stupid, the stupidity does not have to be pointed out - it should be obvious.
THE above said, it would be churlish not to congratulate Aberdeen in reviving the title race. The huge test now for Derek McInnes and his men is to maintain the momentum they undoubtedly got from last night's win.
This has always been the big test for the 40 "Diddy" teams; it is one thing to find the inspiration to skelp one of the cheeks of the Bigot Brothers, it is, seemingly, another to find the inspiration to keep winning, maintain pressure on the BB ahead of them, to force them down and keep them there.
Back in the days BS (before Stein), Willie McCartney and Hugh Shaw at Hibs, Willie Waddell at Kilmarnock, Tommy Walker at Hearts and Bob Shankly at Dundee all found ways to keep their squad focussed and to leave Rangers behind them.
Celtic were then in the doldrums, waiting for the combination of the maturity of such "Kelly Kids" as McNeill, Murdoch, Lennox, Johnstone & Co to be married to Jock Stein's managerial genius, to restore the notion of an all-conquering Old Firm, lording it over the rest.
Today, it is Rangers in the doldrums - can Messrs McInnes, Neilson< Hartley & Co somehow rise to the challenge and give Celtic a real fright, before the RTA gets promoted, or re-organised back into the top division and the status quo is restored? I would like to hope at least one of these managers can?
TO END - putting-on my Kilmarnock supporter's tammy, can I just shout from the roof-tops: "Ally McCoist as Kilmarnock manager - NO FUCKING WAY"!!!
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