The Full Scottish Football Report – Sep 25
The Full Scottish - September 2025
Scottish Football Report – Sep 25. Brian Dunleavy gives a detailed analysis of Celtic’s transfer struggles and the ongoing challenges facing Scottish clubs.
Served by Brian P. Dunleavy
Celtic’s Transfer Window and Squad Challenges:
Celtic faced turmoil in the recent transfer window, losing key players like Kyogo and struggling to find suitable replacements, highlighting ongoing recruitment issues and the pressures of success in Scottish football.
Impact of Scottish Clubs in European Competitions:
Despite dominance domestically, Celtic, Rangers, and Aberdeen all face struggles in European tournaments, which exposes challenges in squad depth and consistency beyond the Scottish Premiership.
Managerial and Administrative Pressures in Glasgow’s Clubs:
Both Celtic and Rangers are under intense scrutiny, with calls for managerial changes and dissatisfaction among supporters, intensifying the pressure on club management to deliver results.
Scottish Football’s Turbulence and Supporter Discontent:
Supporters of clubs like Hamilton and Celtic express discontent through protests and criticism, revealing instability and internal conflicts that threaten the clubs’ futures and operations.
Domestic Performance and Future Outlook of Scottish Teams:
While Celtic and Rangers aim to stabilize their European campaigns, domestically they are in a ‘must-win’ situation, with the overall Scottish football landscape facing uncertainty and the need for strategic adjustments.
Celtic Suffer Transfer Window Trauma
Celtic sits at the top of the Scottish Premiership table as of the first international break on the schedule—the club’s player recruitment department, it seems, remains firmly on the fence.
At least that’s the consensus following a summer transfer window that saw two key members of last season’s squad (striker Adam Idah and winger Nicolas Kuhn) leave with no clear replacements coming back to Glasgow.
As the argument goes, this continues a trend. Last summer, midfielder Matt O’Riley departed for Brighton and was ostensibly replaced by Arne Engels and Paulo Bernardo (for a combined £15 million in transfer fees). Sadly, neither Engels (still our sleeper pick for Player of the Year—we’re not hedging our bets yet) nor Bernardo has featured prominently so far this campaign, and neither has exactly shone brightly when they have made it to the pitch.
Now, Celtic have made a third attempt at replacing O’Riley—this time in the form of Swede Benjamin Nygren—but still apparently have been unable to secure a suitable (and cost-effective) replacement for striker Kyogo, who left in January.
Celtic search for a striker
In what was a chaotic last two days of the summer transfer window (if only Sunday’s Glasgow derby featured half as much drama), the Hoops signed two wingers, Michel-Ange Balikwisha and Sebastian Tounekti (for a combined £11 million), who have played primarily on the left so far in their careers, but no right-sided wingers like Kuhn.
The Hoops’ best attacking player, Daizen Maeda, is also a left-winger. At the same time, they rescued free agent Kelechi Iheanacho from Sevilla’s scrap heap. The Nigerian’s reward will be becoming a living testament to the Celtic board’s “woeful” transfer record.
Indeed, players and managers routinely talk about the unique pressure of playing for Celtic and Rangers: Glasgow’s big two are expected to win week in and week out. As a result, players are given little slack, even those who come to these clubs having been lifelong supporters. Idah scored 20 goals last season in a largely part-time role; still, a large segment of the Celtic support couldn’t wait to get him out the door. In the recent past, Shane Duffy and James McCarthy have arrived at Celtic with much fanfare only to (relatively) quickly become the targets of scorn and ridicule.
James Forrest has been a first-team stalwart for 17 seasons. That hasn’t merited a song from the terraces, apparently. Meanwhile, the stress of running these clubs is rarely discussed. As we have seen, though, particularly with the seemingly constant upheaval in the Rangers’ hierarchy in recent years, collective praise is rare, and every mistake is magnified.
Celtic ‘disaster’ claims
Think about it: Celtic have won the league in 13 of the past 14 seasons. Somehow, nearly every transfer window during that period has been a “disaster.”
Yes, we know, the proving ground for the Hoops lies in Europe, where Idah’s swansong was a missed penalty and several summer signings failed to make Brendan Rodgers’ Europa League squad. So, are the transfer window critics onto something? Undoubtedly.
But count us among those who prefer to wait until the season plays out before we cast the first stone.
Hamilton Drama
Hamilton Academical supporters have been in a conflict with the club’s board for months over its decision last spring to move home league matches from its own stadium to Broadwood Stadium in Cumbernauld (among other issues).
A protest at the new “home ground” in August turned feisty—though NOT criminal—when Police Scotland were called in. This week, a Freedom of Information request from supporters groups confirmed the lack of criminal activity during the protest, which only raised the ire against the club’s board.
This conflict amounts to an existential crisis for a club like Hamilton, which finds itself in League One this term, after a number of years in the Premiership.
It’s hard to imagine the current state of affairs at Celtic rising to that level… Isn’t it?
Celtic And Rangers Bosses Feel The Pressure
One side of Glasgow wants to “sack the board,” while the other pushes to sack the manager. Mark Wilson and the hierarchy at Partick Thistle shouldn’t rest on their laurels. In all seriousness, Wilson, the former Celt and current manager at Championship side Partick Thistle, and his bosses have little to fear, with a 3-1-1 record in the league campaign so far this term. As of this writing, they’re looking for an upset as Celtic visit Fir Hill in the League Cup quarterfinals on Sunday.
Wilson’s side, which sits fourth in the Championship table, may be getting Celtic at a good time. The Hoops are still reeling from a disappointing summer transfer window, the results (or lack thereof) of which have supporters in open revolt and seeking change in the boardroom.
“There are some issues there,” as former Rangers skipper and caretaker manager Barry Ferguson said on his own radio show this week.
Of course, Ferguson only made that comment after Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers defended his counterpart at Ibrox, Russell Martin, against criticism from… wait for it… Ferguson an outstanding player for Rangers and Scotland, who nonetheless has garnered a less-than-stellar record as a manager. His most recent foray as a bench boss? A 15-match role as caretaker at Ibrox to end last season, one that yielded a 6-5-4 record.
Celtic And Rangers In Must Win Mode
What irked Rodgers is that Ferguson still saw fit to question the tactics of his successor, Martin, who, to be fair, has yet to secure a win in the Premiership in the 2025-26 campaign. Hence, the cries of “Martin out” in Govan.
Though what Ferguson is supposed to talk about on his radio show, if not ’Gers and football, remains an open question.
Every week feels pivotal in Scottish football, but both Celtic and Rangers are in must-win mode. Failure to find the “rhythm” Rodgers craves in the near term will only make the anti-board animus at Parkhead more intense, while Martin needs to string together a series of impressive wins just to keep his post.
It’s hard to imagine either of Glasgow’s big two essentially starting over midseason, but both need to quiet the maddening crowds—and soon. Wilson must be relishing the relative calm at Fir Hill.
Celtic, Rangers, Aberdeen all Struggle In Europe
A friend reached out to me this week and asked, “Aberdeen?”
His point was that, five matches into the Premiership campaign, the Dons sit at the bottom of the table, following four losses and a draw. Yes, they have been even worse domestically than Rangers under beleaguered bench boss Russell Martin.
Notably, though, Aberdeen, unlike the Ibrox club, have never been relegated, though we acknowledge, there is an asterisk next to the latter’s drop to the lower leagues.
Following his side’s 2-0 defeat to Dundee United at Tannadice, Aberdeen manager Jimmy Thelin acknowledged that he needs to “find answers quickly.” Well, duh.
The Swede had nearly all the answers last term, with his side challenging Celtic and Rangers to start the season. Ultimately, they faded and finished in fifth, 22 points behind second-place ’Gers. So, has this season continued that fade and marked a return to mean?
Aberdeen in Conference League
Not exactly. To be fair to Thelin, the Dons didn’t have a European campaign to contend with in 2024-25. This season, they do: Having lost in the Europa League play-offs, they are now in the Conference League.
For Scottish clubs not named Celtic or Rangers, squad depth can be an issue when it comes to competing on multiple fronts, as we were just telling Hibs’ manager David Gray the other day.
Thelin also has a squad that relies on decidedly older legs in the middle of the park; midfielders Sivert Heltne Nilsen and Stuart Armstrong (newly signed) are both well into their 30s, and running in well-traveled boots. Same with captain and midfielder/left-back Graeme Shinnie.
At times, that experience can be helpful. However, without any depth behind them—and thus fewer opportunities to rest—it can also be a hindrance, as it appears to have been so far this season.
We have no way of knowing how the Dons will fare in Europe, but our feeling is that they won’t have to worry too much about it after the turn of the year.
In fact, some could say the same for Celtic and Rangers, which both started their Europa League campaigns in less-than-stellar fashion—a 1-1 draw away to FK Crvena zvezda (aka Red Star Belgrade) for the former; a 1-0 loss to Racing Genk (the loan goal scored by former Celt Oh Hyun-Gyu) at home for the latter—this week. Perhaps my friend should be asking, “Scottish football?”