The Men Behind The Nine

The 9 was achieved with 116 players over 334 matches. These are the men behind the 9.

One

There has to be a leader in the appearance list and that is captain Scott Brown. Not only did he appear in all 9 title campaigns, he leads on appearances with 256, 34 more than any other player and one of only two players over 200.

Averaging over 28 appearances per title he never made less than 17 (2012/13).

Brown should surely be considered a giant of this football club for all time.

Two

There were two men who played more than 200 times for Celtic across all 9 campaigns. Brown led the field in more ways than one, but after that comes one of our own. James Forrest has appeared in 222 matches averaging 24.7 appearances per title, and never appearing less than 15 times.

Forrest has blossomed with age and in the last three campaigns has 96 appearances, 29 goals and 35 assists.

He looks like being a one club Bhoy and only 1 player has had more Scoring Contributions (goals and assists) than his 116.

.

Three

Modern football has many demands with many competitions and European rounds starting in July and lasting (hopefully) beyond the new year. Being “ever present” in the age of 60 plus game seasons and 25-30 men squads is very rare.

There are only three occasions players have been ever present in the 9 campaigns, and oddly two of them occurred in the same season:

Player	Season	Games
Ambrose	2013/14	38
Brown	2013/14	38
McGregor	2019/20	30

Four

Two players appeared in 4 different seasons yet racked up less than 20 league appearances between them.

O’Connell managed 7 appearances in his 4 campaigns but Filip Twardzik only 5.

Five

There are two players who made league appearances in 5 different seasons yet only made 40 appearances in total.

Liam Henderson saw action 29 times across 5 seasons whilst Ralston only accrued 11 appearances across the same number of campaigns.

Seven

There are four players outside of Brown, Forrest and one player who appeared in eight campaigns (see below) who contributed to 7 titles.

The magnificent 7 medal haul owners are:

Player	Appearances
Izaguirre	157
Griffiths	151
Bitton	137
Rogic	117

Eight

Only one player appeared in 8 campaigns out the 9 and therefore is third behind Brown and Forrest in total medal haul.

This player is 4^th in the appearance list on 159 and who had 4 injury hit seasons amassing only 47 between 2011/12 and 2014/15. There then followed 4 golden seasons of 112 appearances before finally leaving us with a big gap in the right back position.

That is of course – Lustig!

Eleven

A starting XI worth of players that managed just 1 appearance as their contribution to the 9.

For this economy of effort, we salute you! In line up order (Bailly guests as the ‘keeper – 3 appearances):

Special mention to Arzani who lasted 23 minutes before being carried off with a cruciate injury but waved cheerfully enough from the stretcher – already a Celtic hero.

Twelve

There are 12 players who having played in at least 10 matches and average a goal or an assist every other game. These are the players with the best strike rates for goals and assist per appearance.

If I had the time I’d go back and work out all the minutes played which would be the best measure.

But for now, based on total appearances, Hooper just edges Edouard as the most productive attacking player. They are joined by Moussa Dembele in that elite group averaging over 0.8 goals and assists per appearance.

It is good news 4 of the 12 are still at the club.

Seventeen

There are 17 players who contributed in at least 100 games out of the 334 it has taken to win the 9. In order they are:

Player	Appearances	Seasons (at least 1 App)
Brown	256	9
Forrest	222	9
McGregor	177	6
Lustig	159	8
Izaguirre	157	7
Griffiths	151	7
Gordon	147	5
Bitton	137	7
Commons	135	5
Forster	132	4
Rogic	117	7
Ambrose	113	4
Mulgrew	110	5
Stokes	106	5
Sinclair	104	4
Tierney	102	5
Matthews	101	4

Special mention to Armstrong on 98 who just missed out.

McGregor has only made appearances in 6 of the 9 seasons yet has the 3^rd most total appearances, a testament to his consistency.

The goalkeepers Gordon and Forster benefit from relatively low injury and consistency of selection.

Ambrose never missed a game injured for Celtic so even though he only appeared in 4 of the 9, he makes the list.

But this list represents the spine of what took Celtic to all those titles. They were the constants and delivered season on season.

Only 3 players (Brown, Forrest and McGregor) appeared in over 50% of all the games.

Twenty-Two

There are 73 different players that have provided assists for the 800 goals scored by Celtic in 9 league campaigns

The top 22 have all managed more than 10:

Sixty-Two

As with goals scored, the champion assister is not a close competition.

With 62 assists over 9 campaigns Forrest is the leader by 12 over Commons. Commons is also 3^rd on the goal scorers list and his contribution to the 9 cannot therefore be undervalued.

But the recent form of Forrest with 28 assists in the last two campaigns is hard to resist.

Sixty-Three

63 players have contributed to 785 goals (with 15 being own goals). The full list of scorers with more than 10 is:

Sixty-Four

The outfield player who made the most league appearances without scoring is Kayal, with 64.

Eighty-Four

The top scorer across the 9 is not a close competition. A player who has not had his troubles to seek appeared in 7 of the 9 seasons and is averaging over 10 per campaign.

Griffiths is 30 goals ahead of the next challenger, Forrest, and stands alone as the single biggest contributor to the goal tally.

He contributed 10.5% of all Celtic goals in this era!

One-Hundred and Sixteen

Here it is – the list of all the players, all 116, who have played even a minute in bringing home the 9. As fans, we’d all settle for just that minute.

See how many you had forgotten!

	Apps
Brown	256
Forrest	222
McGregor	177
Lustig	159
Izaguirre	157
Griffiths	151
Gordon	147
Bitton	137
Commons	135
Forster	132
Rogic	117
Ambrose	113
Mulgrew	110
Stokes	106
Sinclair	104
Tierney	102
Matthews	101
Armstrong	98
Boyata	90
Edouard	81
Ajer	80
Ledley	77
Van Dijk	76
Simunovic	75
Johansen	73
Ntcham	72
Samaras	71
Hooper	68
Kayal	64
Wanyama	61
Christie	57
M. Dembele	55
Roberts	55
K. Wilson	47
Mackay-Steven	46
Hayes	45
Sviatchenko	42
Bain	29
Denayer	29
Johnston	29
Ki	29
L. Henderson	29
Jullien	28
McCourt	28
Rogne	27
Pukki	26
Watt	25
Guidetti	24
Balde	20
Benkovic	20
Gamboa	20
McGeouch	20
Scepovic	18
Fisher	17
Majstorovic	17
Boerrigter	16
Hendry	15
Zaluska	15
Bolingoli	14
Burke	14
Cha	14
Frimpong	14
Lassad	14
Morgan	14
Allan	13
Weah	13
Ciftci	12
Janko	12
Kouassi	12
Taylor	12
Bangura	11
Kazim-Richards	11
Loovens	11
Miku	11
Ralston	11
De Vries	10
Elyounoussi	10
Bauer	9
Bayo	9
Toljan	9
Toure	9
M. Wilson	7
O’Connell	7
E. Henderson	6
El Khaddouri	6
Tonev	6
F. Twardzik	5
Wakaso	5
Atajic	4
Berget	4
Cole	4
Elhamed	4
Miller	4
Musonda	4
Aitchison	3
Bailly	3
Blackett	3
Browek	3
Gershon	3
Maloney	3
Chalmers	2
Herron	2
K. Dembele	2
Klimala	2
Mouyokolo	2
Arzani	1
Benyu	1
Fraser	1
Irvine	1
Mulumbu	1
Murphy	1
Rabiu Ibrahim	1
Shved	1
Slane	1
Thomson	1
Welsh	1

One Hundred and Seventeen

Only 3 players have contributed more than 100 Scoring Contributions (goals and assists) to the 9 in a row league seasons.

It’s a close call but Griffiths just edges Forrest by volume and on average per appearance. 117 goals contributed to out of 800 scored means Griffiths has been directly involved in 15% of Celtic’s 9 in a row goals.

Eight Hundred

Celtic have scored exactly 800 goals in their 9 winning seasons, 88.88 per season, fittingly.

63 different players have scored, with Mr. Own Goal, our old friend, chipping in with 15.

23 players have managed 10 or more, whilst 11 scored only 1 league goal.

Those whose historical legacy to 9 is a solitary goal?

Aitchison

Atajic

Boerrigter

Cha

El Khaddouri

Gershon

Kazim-Richards

Loovens

Ralston

Rogne

Sviatchenko

 

Legends every one!

Conclusion

What is telling is that runs such as this are not solely founded on the best players. At a club in Celtic’s position, the Van Dijk’s, Dembele’s, Wanyama’s do not stay for 9 years any more.

No, the men behind the 9, those that were here for 6, 7, 8, 9 seasons are back bone players. Good performers, consistent, the 7 out of 10-ers. Players you build your team round who likely would never play at a bigger club than Celtic but nevertheless perform season after season. This isn’t to damn with faint praise or to patronise, but the likes of Brown, Forrest, Commons, Lustig, Izaguirre, Griffiths, Gordon, Bitton would not be in most people’s top 10 players of all time, but they and others have made a massive contribution to this era of dominance.

Keeping a core of similar players together, supplemented with bright sparkling talent that will shine for a season or two, is the way to go for Celtic as they embark on the next 9.