Celtic take the silent option over embarrassing Cup defeat

For the second season running Celtic’s involvement in the SPFL Trust Trophy has been ended by East Kilbride at the First Round stage, it wasn’t a shock.

A year ago it was a 3-1 defeat, last night it was 3-0 against opponents that lost 8-0 to Airdrie a fortnight ago in the League Cup.

You will struggle for any mention of the match on Celtic’s officials channels. There wasn’t even a preview of the game on the club website, there are certainly no highlights or reaction on You Tube, on X there was a total of three tweets, team news, a half time update followed by a full time tweet that the team had slipped to a 3-0 defeat.

Celtic B are starting their fourth season in the Lowland League with no sign that anyone is gaining from the experience, a look at the team line up that played the first match away to Bonnyrigg Rose in July 2021 shows Bosun Lawal and Rocco Vata as the only players still seriously involved in football.

Tobi Oluwayemi was in goals for Celtic in that match, three years later he has made 11 senior appearances during loan spells at Cork City and Admira Wacker

The team that lost to East Kilbride mainly featured players that were involved in last season’s UEFA Youth League with a few also involved in the first team friendlies earlier this month away to Ayr United and Queens Park.

The B team never played any public pre-season matches and started their Lowland League campaign with a 1-0 win over Cumbernauld Colts on the plastic pitch at Airdrie last Friday.

Quite clearly things have gone badly wrong at the club with Kieran Tierney in season 2015/16 the last regular first team regular to emerge from inside the club.

The last promising batch of prospects included Tony Ralston, Stephen Welsh and Mikey Johnston who have had some moments but seven years after their debuts Ralston and Johnston haven’t established a place in the first team under three different managers.

There are a number of factors contributing to the current situation but what can’t be argued is that the St Ninian’s school project has been a complete failure and needs to be ditched.

Started in 2009 the plan was to combine high class coaching at Lennoxtown with a tailored education programme in nearby Kirkintilloch, in footballing terms it has failed to provide any sort of supply of first team players.

With that issue well established promising players and their parents are reluctant to switch school at a critical time for the prospect of a season or two playing in the Lowland League knowing that there won’t be a second professional contract.

What the actual solution is to producing players again is harder to determine, the lack of a recognisable Reserve League is acknowledged, the Lowland League isn’t an alternative, only providing a demoralising experience for young players.

As Professional Player Pathway Manager a lot of responsibility is on Darren O’Dea to find ways of creating players ready for the Celtic first team, it is a massive job that he has taken on.

Ayr United, Queens Park and Partick Thistle are three clubs that could develop Celtic players at Championship level with home matches played on grass.

Some of the players involved with the first team in the USA could go out on loan to those clubs but as last night illustrated there isn’t much left over in the pipeline.

When Duncan Ferguson took charge of Inverness Caley Thistle he contacted Brendan Rodgers about taking some players out on loan but no business was completed.

Scott Brown of Ayr United knows the players involved at Celtic but taking goalkeeper Josh Clarke on an emergency loan his only involvement with his old club.

On Saturday the B team are away to Broomhill in the Lowland League with the luxury of playing on grass.

Looking at all of the evidence it is hard to see any of last night’s players following in the footsteps of Tierney or Callum McGregor unless massive changes are being implemented.

Other than sending players to Admira Wacker in the Austrian Second Division, with that campaign starting on Friday night, options seem very, very limited.