CELTIC are through to the Europa League group stages after a nervy night in Holland.

The bhoys took a two nil lead over to play Alkmaar in the second leg of the Europa playoff and looked to be cruising through when Kyogo scored an early goal away from home.

Within minutes, Celtic had shot themselves in the foot with Joe Hart hesitating on the ball, resulting in a wide open net.

The second goal was even more freakish when a whipped ball into the box landed at Carl Starfelt but he missed the clearance, the ball hit off his standing foot and into the back of the net. After that, it was an onslaught for the majority of the game from Alkmaar. They had some good chances to get a third and take the tie to extra time.

They were getting desperate towards the end, throwing defenders up front and hoping for a break of the ball. Celtic stood up and got over the line!

With that, Celtic have landed a €3.63m windfall for qualifying. Not a patch on what you get in the Champions League, but money not to be sniffed at for a club in the Scottish league.

Over and above that, performance based bonuses from UEFA could bring in some decent cash. Each win during the group stages is worth €630,000 and a draw will grab both teams €210,000.

Between that and gate receipts – Celtic will be looking at a decent amount of cash from now until December.

With some guaranteed money coming into the club, we could see some movement on transfers.

5 COMMENTS

  1. Yes we may have rode our luck a bit tonight, but that has happened with us many times!. We gave away two silly goals, and put our back to the wheel when required!. Now let us look forward to ibrokes on Sunday! I am sure we will beat sevco, and a!so watch the covac rules change by Sunday.! The ibrokes outfit are no great shakes, as I particularly watch them today, and they could not beat a pub team of ten men! So we should be pretty proud of where we are now ,than from six weeks ago. Go on Celts , let’s see you go!..Hail Hail

  2. We got through but we did it the hard way as usual. We need another centre back and a left back. If that wasn’t obvious to the board last night then nothing is. Kyogo and Turnbull were quiet last night and Rogic was mostly anonymous and we looked a better side when he came off. I think we’ll beat them on Sunday I really do I predict Them 1-3 Celtic I don’t think they’ll be able to live with us as an attacking force and we’ll win comfortably and ruin their flag day. They shouldn’t have been allowed to move it from the traditional first home game of the season, proof again if it were needed that they’re a law unto themselves.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.