LASK 5 Celtic 1 (AET) – The Austrian Champions deservedly progress to the Champions League proper with Celtic dropping into the Europa League after an embarrassing performance at the Raiffeisen Arena last night…
I wrote on Celtic Shorts that I was feeling relaxed about last night. Surely we had done enough in the first leg?
Surely we had learnt our lessons from all the disasters over the years? Go to Austria, take the sting out of the game, head into Thursday’s draw looking forward to another Champions League campaign.
What an absolute fool I was!
This is the Champions League playoff round. We know how this goes…
I said  that under Martin O’Neill we seemed to have mastered how to play away in Europe. I completely dismissed that he hasn’t had to manage a team in this qualification situation in many many years.
The mental block remains. We just can’t seem to finish the job in these moments. This tie was there for us. Served up on a silver platter. We absolutely blew it. That may be the understatement of the year.
The first thing I’m going to say is that LASK, over the two legs, fully deserved to progress.
3-0 flattered us in the first leg. LASK had huge chances in the first leg and nothing fell their way. Everything went Celtic’s way on the night.
Last night we deserved what we got. We were passive. We were too nervous. We were absolutely terrible. We have been hailing this team as one who could be the most exciting in a long time. This calamity showed they are miles off it.
Even more incredible about tonight is that we actually took the lead. 4-0 on aggregate. How we managed to lose it from there is honestly one of the most inconceivable things I have ever witnessed.
There are no excuses. We absolutely blew it. After Callum McGregor’s goal we should have slowed the game down. Went completely risk adverse. Defend for your lives for the next 45 minutes. We came out after half time and looked completely lifeless. I honestly can’t even fathom how we lost it from that point.
This result is a sliding door moment. Qualify for the Champions League and this season was set up to be an exciting one. Fans, board, management and players all feeding off the positivity. This one result has ruined it.
I worry how this will effect the season. The negativity around the club over the next period will be enormous. It shouldn’t be this way. Unfortunately it is.
The board will get a lot of hate for this result but honestly, I think the players and the management deserve our ire more than anyone. They let us down tonight. Some of the substitutions were questionable to say the least. Bad decisions were made. Everyone loves Martin O’Neill but he shouldn’t be shielded from criticism. He made mistakes.
There are players who after tonight have no future at Celtic. Luke McCowan looked like he had won a competition when he came on as a sub. I can’t remember a worse performance. I have tried to back him as a squad player in the past but last night proved he’s not even that.
He wasn’t the only one who let us down. Players who have spent the last few weeks getting smoke blown up their rear end failed to deliver when the heat was on.
People talked about Høgh and Duran being world class in recent weeks. Not on last night’s evidence. Nygren started the season looking like a new and improved version of what we seen last season. In Linz all his weaknesses reappeared.
Our centre backs looked slow and static all night. They got away with it in the first leg. Not this time.
Another thing that really frustrated me was that we didn’t bring Hassan on. A player with speed who could take us up the pitch. Surely that was a no brainer? How important could he have been in extra time? Or even someone like Callum Osmand? We needed legs and instead we got footballing snails like McCowan, Hatate and Ralston.
I could dissect this all day long but I don’t need to. You all saw our shortcomings in front of your own eyes.
The fallout from this will be horrendous. What looked like a hugely promising season all disappeared in a puff of smoke in the Raiffeisen Arena.
Where we go from here I don’t know. It was hard to sleep well last night. Didn’t have to worry about nightmares however. I had the worst one of all whilst fully awake.
Conall McGinty
A brutal assessment from Callum McGregor after Celtic’s Champions League exit.#BBCFootball pic.twitter.com/vM1qx0XKdk
— BBC Sport Scotland (@BBCSportScot) August 25, 2026
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2 Comments
I am disappointed that we didn’t get through but we didn’t play well enough to go through. There are some players that need to have a good look at themselves Luke came on and was looked lost giving the ball away, it looked like he didn’t want to be there. He lost the ball and they scored, he had thee ball on 2 occasions after that near their box and lost it when their defender runs the whole length of the park Luke is jogging back slowly when all his teammates are sprinting to get back. I couldn’t believe what I was watching, he doesn’t deserve a Celtic shirt
First, the substitutions were so bad because we had no one to bring on. Hatate chucked it a season ago, McCowan no where near this level. Where was the Hassan substitution, with Duran going central to replace Hogh, who was worse than useless on the night?. Instead we brought on second rate defenders when it was too late, and not what was needed.
Second, we had no options off the bench, cause we didn’t buy them, even though they’ve been needed for 1.5-2 years, no Sarrachi, no Ienachio, who should have been slam dunks. To top it off, sell the only remaining midfielder who could have brought some physicality and defence, and ofc didn’t replace him.
Third, I said last season, that although Martin had worked miracles using his strength, motivating players, he in no one could take the squad forward. Maybe he’d just about get by in the SPFL with the ‘no tactics’, tactical approach, never in Europe though. He even said this himself at the end of last season, out of the game for over 20 years, out of touch, and out of any idea about the modern game.
Four, a team who were looking comfortable let themselves be affected by an individual mistake, and not only embarrassed us, but made themselves look like my grandsons team when suffering a setback, they are 16. The players were a disgrace, including McGregor, who has been off it for at least a season, his days of carrying a midfield alone, long gone, alas.
Last but not least, a board who are a disgrace, who have downsized since Bayern, and whose idea of making sure of the Champions League cash, is to leave us short of players, and even sell some in the build up. But hey!, they’re sitting at £10 mill profit so far from flogging the family silver(again), and will now add to that with more sales.
Ps special mention for the fans, who keep shoveling tons of cash to these charlatans, who must be world class in everything they do, why else would so many people part with so much cash?.