Would We Actually Be Healthier Having Lost The League? The Dangerous Comfort Of Winning And A Board Allergic To Urgency

The most dangerous thing to happen to this club this summer isn’t a rival appointment.

It’s the trophy in the cabinet.

I know. I know how that sounds.

For years, a thought like that would’ve felt like betrayal. We won the league. End of conversation.

But trophies have a habit of becoming a problem at this club.

And the more I sit with it, the more I think winning might have quietly cost us something this summer.

Winning As An Excuse To Do Nothing

This is the bit that worries me.

A trophy is supposed to be the reward for getting things right.

At Celtic, it increasingly feels like a reason to avoid fixing what’s wrong.

Because once that league is mathematically over, the entire mood shifts. The pressure evaporates. The questions stop. And a board that spent the back end of the season getting dragged into a scrap with Hearts and that lot suddenly gets to act like everything is fine.

It isn’t fine.

We all watched it. The season was uncomfortable in a way it simply shouldn’t have been. We didn’t run anyone ragged. We found a way – and finding a way is admirable in a run-in, but it’s not a strategy you build a club around.

If you finish top of the pile, you can tell yourself the gaps weren’t really gaps.

Now the board can look at a squad that was crap all season and decide it only needs “a couple of tweaks”.

That’s the trap. That’s the whole trap. Winning hands Dermot Desmond and Michael Nicholson an excuse to keep the chequebook shut.

For me, you couldn’t design a more perfect alibi for inaction if you tried.

And Nicholson will use it.

The “Ambition” Gap Across The City

Now look at what’s happening around us.

Sevco have appointed Derek McInnes.

And before anyone tells me what they think of him, I don’t care. Whether you rate McInnes or think he’s a step backwards for Castle Greyskull is genuinely beside the point. The point is the intent.

They’re reshaping. They’re moving. They’re making decisions like a club that’s been hurt and wants to do something about it.

Is it the right move? Maybe not. McInnes carrying expectations at a bigger club is a very different thing from McInnes as a plucky underdog at Tynecastle.

But that’s not my worry.

My worry is the contrast.

They’re acting. We’re admiring our own reflection.

Their ambition is being shown.

Have We Actually Learned Anything?

What did we learn from last season?

Because from where I’m sitting, the lessons were screaming at us.

Europe was humbling. Again. The same structural problems, the same depth issues the moment one or two key men were unavailable. We’ve been here so many times it’s stopped being a shock and started being a personality trait.

For me, that’s the bit Martin O’Neill will already know. He’s managed at the highest level. He knows the difference between a squad that won a league and a squad that can win in Europe. And he’ll need backing – genuine backing.

And the squad? I’ve already laid out the scale of what’s coming – keepers, defenders, a midfield that needs four or five bodies, and more depth in attack.

That’s a rebuild.

And the genuine fear is that the board looks at a title and sees a rebuild as optional.

Worse – there’s a version of this summer where they sell Maeda, call it “excellent succession planning”, and present a weaker squad to us as “evolution”.

Because that’s the trick, isn’t it?

When you win, you get to dress up cost-cutting as cleverness.

Could Losing Have Actually Forced Their Hand?

Here’s the thought experiment.

Picture the alternative.

We finish second. The title goes to Tynecastle.

What happens then?

The pressure on the board would be enormous. Immediate. Unavoidable. There’d be support demanding answers.

Standing still would be impossible. Selling Maeda would be unthinkable. The phrase “player trading model” would get a director chased out of the room.

For me, that’s the version of this summer I almost wish we were living in.

Defeat would’ve forced a statement of intent.

Would’ve made aggressive investment the only acceptable answer.

And would have stripped away every excuse.

And isn’t that the maddening part? Sometimes a club only acts decisively when it’s hurt. Sometimes losing is the only language a comfortable boardroom understands.

I’m not saying I wanted us to lose. Of course I didn’t.

But I’d be lying if I said the comfort of winning doesn’t frighten me more than the sting of losing would have.

The Real Threat Isn’t McInnes

So let me land this where it belongs.

Our biggest danger next season isn’t Derek McInnes.

It isn’t a rebuilt Sevco or a refreshed Hearts or whoever else fancies a go.

It’s us.

It’s a boardroom that mistakes a trophy for a verdict. A board that hears “champions” and decides the work is done. A board that treats “good enough last season” as a guarantee of “good enough next season” – when last season was uncomfortable enough to prove the exact opposite.

The challenge across the city is real, but it’s manageable if we raise our level. The thing is, this board’s ambition only ever rises to match the challenge in front of it – never to set the standard.

That’s the bit that has to change.

We should be improving because that’s what serious clubs do.

From a position of strength. While the window’s open. Before the gap closes.

So here’s my challenge to Desmond, to Nicholson, to the whole lot of them.

Prove the title didn’t make you lazy.

Key Takeaways

• Winning the league risks handing Desmond and Nicholson a convenient excuse to avoid the rebuild the squad clearly needs.
• Sevco (under McInnes) and a rebuilding Hearts are showing visible intent – Celtic risk confusing “stability” with standing still.
• The warning signs from last season – Europe, squad depth, over-reliance on key men – were lessons, not one-offs.
• Defeat could have forced aggressive investment and a genuine statement of intent; victory makes complacency the path of least resistance.
• Martin O’Neill will need real financial backing this summer – not a press release dressed up as ambition.
• The real threat next season isn’t a rival – it’s the board believing “good enough last season” will automatically be good enough again.