LASK ONE LAUGHING<\/p>\n
When Celtic opened the scoring against Lask courtesy of a low Callum McGregor shot after 21 minutes on Tuesday night, the Scottish champions looked to have exorcised their Bigger Cup demons from 12 months ago. Four goals ahead of their Austrian hosts on aggregate, it seemed utterly inconceivable that Martin O\u2019Neill\u2019s side could emulate, let alone eclipse, their humiliation at the hands of Kairat Almaty last August and the match commentator intoned as much. \u201cAnd with that moment, this tie surely moves beyond the grasp of Lask,\u201d soothed Bill Leslie, as the Celtic skipper\u2019s deflected daisy-cutter fizzed past the home goalkeeper and rippled the Austrian champions\u2019 net. While one could argue Bill has commentated on enough fitba over the years to know better than to count unhatched chickens, not even the combined forces of Mystic Meg and Nostradamus could have foreseen the calamitous capitulation<\/a> that was about to unfold. From a position of apparent indomitability, Celtic proceeded to ship five goals without reply to endure what is arguably the Grand Old Team To Play For\u2019s greatest European embarrassment yet.<\/p>\n \u201cWe should have been out of sight by half-time,\u201d wailed Martin O\u2019Neill<\/a> at the end of a 5-1 second leg pasting that actually flattered his side. \u201cWe scored a goal, which was great. We missed two great, great opportunities. And then we give them a lifeline just before half-time and then one just after it. And they come roaring back. And obviously we conceded, from our viewpoint, not good goals at all. But that\u2019s my team and that\u2019s my responsibility.\u201d Of course, O\u2019Neill\u2019s was just one of many angry post-mortems with Celtic grandees such as Chris Sutton, Kasper Schmeichel, Stiliyan Petrov and Neil Lennon all queuing up to stick the boot in, having apparently forgotten their contributions to various Euro horror shows for the club down the years.<\/p>\n While Celtic\u2019s exit at the same stage of Bigger Cup last season was attributed to a famously parsimonious board\u2019s reluctance to spend money on players until after qualification for the league phase had been secured, the same accusation cannot be levelled this time around. Having parted with \u00a323m \u2013 a decent wedge by fitba standards \u2013 on four new players over the summer with more due through the door, club bean-counters are now being criticised for selling top players Arne Engels and Daizen Maeda before qualification had been secured. Unable to do right for doing wrong, Celtic\u2019s owners must now mull over the loss of a series of Bigger Cup paydays that could cost them as much as \u00a340m. It will be a source of constant regret that Tuesday\u2019s second leg wasn\u2019t played at Celtic<\/a> Park, where the timely and now traditional pitch invasion would almost certainly have denied Lask the 90th-minute goal that took the tie to extra time.<\/p>\n While Celtic\u2019s humbling is also an embarrassment for Scottish fitba, there will be little or no sympathy from rivals who will view their misfortune as karmic retribution for a title acquired through a combination of highly questionable refereeing and some atrocious fan behaviour during that final-day title decider against Hearts. \u201cWe got what we deserved,\u201d seethed McGregor after the game. \u201cNow we\u2019ll see what people are made of,\u201d he added, having just shown what he and his teammates were made of. After Tuesday\u2019s shambles, one suspects it will take more than a home win over Falkirk on Saturday to ease the pain.<\/p>\n LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE<\/p>\n Join John Brewin at 7.45pm (BST) for goal updates from the matches in the second round of the Milk Cup.<\/p>\n RECOMMENDED FOLLOWING<\/p>\n Now on BlueSpace<\/a>, TikBook<\/a>, Instachat<\/a>, all the lesser disgraces.\u200a<\/p>\n QUOTE OF THE DAY<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I made the substitutions, including taking [him] off, I believed the players coming on could make an impact. I came here to help the players, so as I said, I\u2019m proud of them because every substitute made a positive contribution\u201d \u2013 a penny for Roberto Mart\u00ednez\u2019s thoughts as Ange Postecoglou explains how substituting Cristiano Ronaldo with his 10-man Al-Nassr side 2-0 down, helped them to mount an extraordinary comeback to beat Al-Ettifaq 3-2.<\/p>\n Cristiano Ronaldo before he was hooked. Photograph: Hamad I Mohammed\/Reuters<\/p>\n double quotation markI gave up trying to understand football finances long ago, but even so I\u2019m staggered by how many clubs have been able to get shot of underperforming recruits recently, for a price way more than they paid for the (now unwanted) player in the first place. Oh, and while I\u2019m here, anyone interested in buying a second hand telly? The sound doesn\u2019t work and I\u2019ve lost the remote; I paid \u00a350 for it but I\u2019ll take \u00a3100\u201d \u2013 Phil Taverner.<\/p>\n double quotation markNoble Francis\u2019s letter about Chelsea\u2019s game-winning arithmetic tactics (yesterday\u2019s Football Daily letters<\/a>) is so reminiscent of Kevin Keegan\u2019s Newcastle. Who cares if the other side score nine, we\u2019ll score 10, seemed to be the mindset. As for Chelsea against the rest of the Premier League, for the sake of my fantasy team, I\u2019ll love it if they beat them\u201d \u2013 Ken Muir.<\/p>\n If you have any, please send letters to the.boss@theguardian.com<\/a>. Today\u2019s prizeless letter o\u2019 the day goes to \u2026 Phil Taverner. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, are here<\/a>.\u200a<\/p>\n RECOMMENDED BUYING<\/p>\n Football Weekly Live events are coming. If you want to see Max Rushden, Barry Glendenning and other top, top pod squad members in the flesh, you can do so in Dublin on 1 September<\/a> or that there London on 9 September<\/a>.\u200a\u200a<\/p>\n ELECTRIC YOUTH<\/p>\n What were you doing during the 2011 PlayStation Network outage? It was a dark time for those who like headsets and prefer to keep the curtains closed. Although their IDs had likely been exposed to the shadowiest parts of the internet, gamers were finally relieved when the service resumed on 14 May. Noah Anyadike was barely home from hospital, having been born three days prior on the 11th. For context, Frank Ocean\u2019s Nostalgia, Ultra was released in February 2011 and Fast Five hit the cinemas in April. Now, 15 years and 98 days later, the Welshman has become the youngest player ever to appear in the Rumbelows Cup. \u201cIt was an incredible evening for him and really well deserved. We\u2019ve been lucky because he\u2019s still in school, so he spent so much time with us in the school holidays,\u201d said Cardiff\u2019s head of PE boss Brian Barry-Murphy. Football Daily is off to consider where it went wrong in life.<\/p>\n NEWS, BITS AND BOBS<\/p>\n Uefa is poised to drop<\/a> its threatened boycott of Fifa competitions after receiving concrete guarantees that the global governing body will never attempt a repeat of Gianni Infantino\u2019s plan to sell stakes in the World Cup.<\/p>\n Raheem Sterling has been charged with dangerous driving and possession of nitrous oxide<\/a> after a collision involving a Lamborghini on the M3. The former England forward will appear at Basingstoke magistrates court on 15 September for a hearing.<\/p>\n Manchester City have signed 18-year-old midfield metronome<\/a> Ayyoub Bouaddi from Lille for \u00a385.6m, a maths whizz who can probably double up as an accountant at the Etihad to really earn his corn. Meanwhile, Omar Marmoush has left City to grab a season-long loan move to Tottenham<\/a>, while Nico Gonz\u00e1lez is off from City to Newcastle for an FFP-pleasing \u00a352m. Also on the move: Liam Delap, whose long-touted transfer from Chelsea to Nottingham Forest has finally been confirmed for, erm, a snip at \u00a350m.<\/p>\n Ayoub Bouaddi gets his pose on. Photograph: Manchester City FC<\/p>\n Manchester United\u2019s Bruno Fernandes and Manchester City\u2019s Khadija Shaw have won the respective male and female PFA player of the year gongs<\/a>. Nico O\u2019Reilly of City and Arsenal\u2019s Olivia Smith picked up the young player of the year awards.<\/p>\n Chelsea have been offered Emiliano Mart\u00ednez<\/a> and, perhaps after witnessing some familiar goalkeeping errors against Fulham, are considering making an offer for the Aston Villa stopper.<\/p>\n In the Rumbelows Cup second round, Coventry were given a test by League One Plymouth before coming through 4-2<\/a> at Home Park, while Leeds beat Forest<\/a> at the City Ground for the second time in four days, Brentford cruised to a 6-1 thrashing away at Birmingham, West Ham won 4-1 at Southampton and Watford were humbled 0-5 at home to Peterborough.<\/p>\n And Xavi says he doesn\u2019t mind having been being third-choice<\/a> for the Netherlands job. \u201cWell, it\u2019s not a bad position, after Guardiola and after Slot, no? At least you are at the podium,\u201d he parped. \u201cI don\u2019t care if I\u2019m the third or I\u2019m the 10th [choice]. It\u2019s a big honour to be here.\u201d<\/p>\n MOVING THE GOALPOSTS<\/p>\n Our sister email has landed<\/a> on Bristol City\u2019s aim to \u201csupercharge growth\u201d after splitting from their men\u2019s team and flying solo.<\/p>\n STILL WANT MORE?<\/p>\n Our latest WSL preview has hit the digital pages, today Sophie Downey is looking at newly-promoted Charlton<\/a>.<\/p>\n David Hytner has been writing about how S\u00e1vio<\/a>, the artist formerly known as Savinho, will be part of Spurs\u2019 bigger rebrand.<\/p>\n Spurs get the composite image treatment. Composite: Colorsport\/Shutterstock; Tottenham Hotspur FC\/Shutterstock; Tom Jenkins\/The Guardian<\/p>\n Ayyoub Bouaddi has arrived at Manchester City with the unenviable task of replacing Rodri, Will Unwin profiles the studious \u00a385.6m midfielder<\/a>, who is ready to tackle the Premier League.<\/p>\n It\u2019s the Rumour Mill, with some fluff suggesting Jean-Philippe Mateta might be heading to Aston Villa<\/a>, baby.<\/p>\n And keep up with the latest transfer window moves via our men\u2019s<\/a> and women\u2019s<\/a> interactives on the world\u2019s biggest leagues.<\/p>\n MEMORY LANE<\/p>\n Let\u2019s wind back to 1996, when Jimmy the cat was named Cat of the Year at an awards ceremony in London. The four-year-old, pictured here with his 10-year-old owner Andrew Tierney, was a keen Subbuteo player who was rescued after being thrown on a bonfire.<\/p>\n Andrew Tierney and Jimmy the cat Photograph: Neil Munns\/PA Archive\/PA Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LASK ONE LAUGHING When Celtic opened the scoring against Lask courtesy of a low Callum McGregor shot after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":869141,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-869140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=869140"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869140\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/869141"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=869140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=869140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=869140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}