| Matches: 2016 – 2017 | Champions League |
Trivia
Pre-Group
- Celtic must overcome three rounds to reach the Champions League
- Enter at second round stage.
- Brendan Rodgers first season as Celtic manager.
- Rodgers first competitive match ends in embarrassment as Celtic beaten by Gibraltar part time outfit Lincoln Red Imps. Celtic easily defeat them in second round.
- Celtic return to Kazakhstan for third round, and defeat Astana with the help of some penalties (late ones in both halves).
- Reports that Uefa to restructure competition and make automatic entry for top four in major leagues. Pathetic! Will seriously damage competition and make harder for those in the already cut throat qualifiers.
- Celtic overcome Hapoel Beer Sheva in two widely differing games in the playoffs. Hammered them at home 5-2, but then cling on in the away leg in a two nil defeat. Still Celtic qualify, just.
- Fans make name for themselves globally after being charged for a Palestinian flag display at Celtic Park against Hapoel Beer Sheva; the fans raised a charity roundup of over 150k to be donated to related charities. Wonderful gesture. (see link)
- Celtic qualify for group stages for first time in three years.
- Brendan Rodgers first Celtic manager to qualify Celtic to group stages on his first attempt (for Celtic).
Group Stages
- Group C: Barcelona, Man City, Borussia Moen…, Celtic (pot 4)
- Another group of death as the cliché goes.
- Celtic seemed to be joined at the hip to Barcelona with these draws,keep being drawn with them. Both sets of fans getting a little sick of the sight of each other, despite good relations with each other.
- First time in group stages in 3 years.
- Celtic’s luck run out and out with one game to go
- Celtic finish group on 3pts, with three draws. Bottom of group table.
- First time we’ve managed a better away record than home record in group stages.
- Dembele gets international notice esp following a double v Man City. Raising his stature.
- Rodgers has mixed outcome. Tactically done well in games v Barca at home, Man City at home and Borussia away, but badly lost out away v Barca and at home v Borussia M.
- Man City 3-3 game is a highlight, and got the club recognition globally. An amazing game to watch.
- Atmosphere was exceptional across the board. Again club won respect for the fans.
- Man City games attended by former Oasis (band) members.
- Celtic could have maybe squeaked through if Celtic had beaten Borussia M away, Callum McGregor should have passed the ball late on when on against the goalkeeper. Wasn’t to be, although still needed results to go our way.
- Dembele states he wants to stay for another season. The effect of the Celtic Champions League experience has convinced him it seems.
- Lots of good performances, things on the up.
- Messi for Barcelona scorred ten goals in this group stage. Incredible footballer.
- Barca hammered each opponent in at least one game.
- Celtic’s return to the Champions League is likely to have netted the club £27.5 million in revenues before gate receipts are included. Newspaper estimates, but it won’t take into account, cuts/costs etc. Still a tidy sum for Celtic.
- Celtic’s 7-0 defeat to Barca is worst result in European football for Celtic, but there have been a number of high scoring victories/defeats in the competition this season.
Review
“The competition this year was about improvement and I think we can see that.”
Brendan Rodgers
After the humiliation in Europe in the past season, with the club finisihing bottom of a low quality Europa League, expectations were low. New manager and new challenge meant we had a chance to put the past more easily away and reboot.
The qualifiers seems to get tougher each year, and this time was no different. The problem is having to hit the ground running and smaller countries are being unfairly treated. The goalposts for smaller country sides is going to get even smaller with the recent ruling that the big four countries will now automatically get four teams in each to the Champions League. Will make it all more predicatable and less interesting.
The first set of games v Lincoln Red Imps of Gibraltar began with one of our most humbling defeats in our history, going down to the bottom tier side 1-0 away. Actually, despite the result there was little wailing and gnashing of teeth as expected Celtic whoooped them comfortably 3-0 at home. For Brendan Rodgers it was a sharp shock to the system, but at least gave him room to cut players, most notably Efe Ambrose.
If that shock wasn’t enough, the next round v Astana meant another long round-trip to Kazakhstan, and what a close run thing it was too. Looked to be heading to penalties after a 1-1 result in the first game and stuck at 1-1 in the home leg too. The tension was ratcheting up. A late late penalty conceded gave Dembele the chance to finally get his goal scoring going and provide relief to all. It all looked ominous, but that penalty thankfully save everyone’s bacon.
If Celtic were to now make things easier for the fans, then that wasn’t to bethe case. Home game was a culmination of all the gains that Celtic had made in Rodgers time as the first team romped through 5-2 in the first leg. So what should have been an easy buffer to protect turned into a near nightmare with Rodgers conceding it was the longest 90mins of his life. Celtic really scraped through 2-0, and through much of the game it looked like the oppositionwould make it through, if anything Rodgers got badly out-thought by his opposite number and only a change of tactics by Rodgers in the second half turned things around for Celtic. It was too close for comfort.
However, as some pointed out, last season with Deila when things went against Celtic, heads remained down. With Rodgers, he’d spring into action and start making needed changes. That was a major difference. Rodgers had taken Celtic through using mostly the same side that failed badly in the past season.
One aspect though overshadowed all else. It’s not the first time that Celtic have faced competition from [….] but politics was rearing its head [….expand here on HBS….]
Group Stages
[…write-up needed…]
Matches
| Date | Competition | Home Team | Score | Score | Away Team | Report | Pictures | Notes |
| JUL | ||||||||
| 12th |
European Cup |
Lincoln Red Imps |
1 |
0 |
Celtic |
Report | Pictures | KO: 17:00; Qualifying Round, Second Round, 1st Leg |
| 20th |
European Cup |
Celtic |
3 |
0 |
Lincoln Red Imps |
Report | Pictures | KO: 20:00; Qualifying Round, Second Round, 2nd Leg (agg. 3-1) |
| 27th |
European Cup |
Astana |
1 |
1 |
Celtic |
Report |
Pictures |
KO: 14:00 Qualifying round, Third Round, 1st leg |
| AUG | ||||||||
| 3rd |
European Cup |
Celtic |
2 |
1 |
Astana |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45 (BST); Qualifying round, Third Round, 2nd leg (agg. 3-2) |
| 17th |
European Cup | Celtic |
5 |
2 |
Hapoel Beer Sheva |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45; Play-offs 1st Leg |
| 23rd |
European Cup | Hapoel Beer Sheva |
2 |
0 |
Celtic |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45 (BST); Play-offs 2nd Leg (agg Celtic 5-4 HBS) |
| SEP | ||||||||
| 13th |
European Cup | Barcelona |
7 |
0 |
Celtic |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45, Match 1 |
| 28th |
European Cup |
Celtic |
3 |
3 |
Manchester City |
Match | Pictures | KO: 19:45; Match 2 |
| OCT | ||||||||
| 19th |
European Cup | Celtic |
0 |
2 |
Borussia Monchengladbach |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45; Match 3 |
| NOV |
||||||||
| 1st |
European Cup | Borussia Monchengladbach |
1 |
1 |
Celtic |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45; Match 4 |
| 23rd |
European Cup | Celtic | 0 |
2 |
Barcelona |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45; Match 5; Celtic out of Europe |
| DEC |
||||||||
| 6th |
European Cup | Manchester City |
1 |
1 |
Celtic |
Report | Pictures | KO: 19:45; Match 6 |
|
Pos
|
Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts |
| 1 | Barcelona | 6 | 5 | 0 | 1 | 20 | 4 | 16 | 15 |
| 2 | Manchester City | 6 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 12 | 10 | 2 | 9 |
| 3 | Borussia Mönchengladbach | 6 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 12 | −7 | 5 |
| 4 | Celtic | 6 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 16 | −11 | 3 |