Bhoycie 
There will be plenty said about the players after what happened in Austria last night. There should be.
There will be questions asked of Martin O’Neill too. Again, there should be.
But my first reaction to Celtic somehow turning a 4-0 aggregate advantage into a 5-4 elimination isn’t really about either of them. Celtic led 3-0 from Glasgow, Callum McGregor made it four on aggregate, and somehow LASK scored five unanswered goals to dump Celtic into the Europa League.
My question is much bigger.
How many times does this need to happen before somebody accepts Celtic have a fundamental problem at boardroom level?
Let’s put LASK into context.
This is a club who, before last season, hadn’t won the Austrian title since 1965. That’s 61 years. Their 2025/26 championship was only their second Austrian title.
LASK’s record signing is Marin Ljubičić at €2.9million. Their entire expenditure this summer is listed at around €3.3million.
This isn’t Real Madrid we’re talking about.
Yet look at Celtic by the end of that tie.
Liam Scales at left-back. Dane Murray at centre-back. Tony Ralston at right-back. Luke McCowan in midfield.
The question is whether that looks like a football club that has prepared properly for the Champions League.
Does it?
Because it doesn’t to me.
We’re talking about the elite club competition in world football, with tens of millions of pounds sitting on the other side of one qualifying tie, and Celtic continually approach these summer qualifiers looking like they’re still assembling the aeroplane while it’s already halfway down the runway.
Then everybody acts surprised when it doesn’t take off.
Last night’s collapse reportedly cost Celtic at least £20million in lost Champions League revenue.
That’s what makes the penny-pinching in the transfer market so utterly infuriating.
We hear about negotiations dragging on. We hear about gaps of a few hundred thousand pounds. We hear about Celtic trying to squeeze another little victory out of a selling club.
And then?
Bang.
Another Champions League jackpot disappears.
How many £100,000 or £200,000 negotiating victories do you need to make up for losing £20million-plus because the squad wasn’t ready when the Champions League qualifiers actually arrived?
That isn’t prudent anymore.
It’s false economy.
And here’s the bit Celtic cannot brush underneath the carpet.
Different players.
Different managers.
Same outcome.
Neil Lennon failed to negotiate Champions League qualification. Ange Postecoglou failed in his qualifying attempt. Brendan Rodgers failed last season. Now Martin O’Neill has suffered one of the most extraordinary European collapses in Celtic’s history.
Celtic’s last successful navigation of Champions League qualifying was under Rodgers in 2017. The current run has now reached six consecutive unsuccessful attempts to qualify through the preliminary rounds.
So at what point do we stop treating every failure as an isolated incident?
You can change the manager.
You can change the striker.
You can change the goalkeeper.
You can change half the squad.
But if the people determining the strategy remain and Celtic continually arrive at the biggest qualifiers of their season inadequately prepared, why should we expect the result to change?
Under Michael Nicholson’s stewardship as chief executive, Celtic have now failed to navigate the Champions League qualifiers when required in three consecutive seasons.
That is not a blip.
That’s a pattern.
And patterns come from strategy.
The players absolutely capitulated last night. We’ll get to that. Martin will have questions to answer about how Celtic managed the game. We’ll get to that too.
But neither should be allowed to provide convenient cover for something that’s been staring Celtic supporters in the face for years.
The club’s approach to Champions League qualification doesn’t work.
It hasn’t worked under multiple managers. It hasn’t worked with multiple squads. And it has now cost Celtic another enormous sporting and financial opportunity.
Eventually accountability has to travel higher than the dressing room.
For me, we’re already there.
Same board. Same strategy. Same outcome.
Something has to change.
Keep Your Eyes On The Board? It’s past that now.
Celtic fan born & bread, always lived and breathed Celtic & for the very first and last time feeling utterly deflated & embarrassed. This spectacular football clubs LOYAL fans deserve at the very least fire and fight from every man in the green n white unfortunately for OUR club last night was an absolute sliding doors moment of epic failure. Heads must go and answers need explaining to 67000 weekly and millions of the most devotedly blind fans worldwide..
People whose everyday mood and life is affected massively by this spectacular collapse. Wounded Tim…
Words fail me in even trying to define that performance or pantomime may be more apt. The only words I have stated over and over is until we get rid of that board nothing changes. We’re a laughing stock in Europe when it comes to negotiating deals now you can add the team, manager and coaches to that. Supporters got their hopes up with the new additions thinking that the dinosaurs had actually changed strategy. Nope, haggling over pennies while time is running out for a CL game. As harsh as it is we are only going to get shot of them through refusal to renew season books and right there is the biggest hold that board have over supporters. I haven’t given them a penny since the campaign started and I won’t be until hell freezes over by the looks of it. Jesus wept.