“Celtic winger Aiden McGeady looks set to call it a day on his Celtic career in what will be a major blow to new Hoops manager Neil Lennon.” – STV announcing that Aidan McGeady will leave Celtic for £9m.

“HIBS top scorer Anthony Stokes is back on Celtic's radar.” – Daily Express linking Celtic with our east coast feeder club – again.

“According to the latest reports in the English press, Coca-Cola Championship side Middlesbrough are looking to bring Giorgos Samaras to the Riverside.” – Greek Soccer bringing some good news to relieve the gloom.

Comrades, Brothers, fellow foot soldiers of the great revolution… nah sod it, I’m not keeping that style up for the whole article. I thought about it after reading the club’s bold declaration of revolutionary intent, but I find that claim a bit hard to square with reality, which, a few personnel changes aside, looks pretty much like the same old. I mean a revolution normally involves great transformation, social upheaval, a lot of capitalists placed against a wall (stops to dream wistfully), and statues lying in pieces while small children dance upon the broken remains. The concept of Revolution doesn’t really include having a few new appointments and everything carrying on as normal, not exactly the storming of the Bastille or the capture of the Winter Palace. Still, we are told that, lucky us, we are living in the era of the Lennon Revolution, and yes its early days so you never know, this might just be the phoney revolution before the real barricade burning begins.

So where are we with this Revolution so far? Well following the mass execution of the previous management team, Lennon has been joined by Alan Thompson and Johan Mjallby, which does lend an encouraging aspect to the proceedings. Willie McStay on the other hand has been purged by Comrade Lenin (do that once more and you’re fired – ed) to make room for Garry Parker. Contrary to spiteful rumours, Comrade Parker has not been earning an honest crust painting and decorating for the past ten years. According to Lennon Parker was employed by Aston Villa, however someone might want to update Garry’s Wikipedia entry as his “life after playing” section merely contains the following: “Parker was featured on Sky Sports programme called Where Are They Now where he talked about his times as a player, about being a painter and decorator, and how he misses the dressing room banter.”

Further investigation by your daring reporter has established that Parker was indeed employed at Aston Villa, being head hunted from the painting and decorating world (or something) to scout for Martin O’Neill. According to Steve Walsh, quoted in the Daily Record so apply the standard caution: “Garry has been scouting for Villa and there are a lot of people who would be happy to help him and Neil, Martin O'Neill for one. He can spot a good player and that can be very helpful.” Helpful? With Celtic recently such an ability would almost be unique. If he has that talent then sorry Willie but needs must. Lennon of course is in the process of losing his transfer market virginity, so any help at all would be an advantage. After all, Celtic’s forays into the transfer market for years now have been as competent as a Cheryl Cole mime, resulting in a bewildering array of transitory appearances by individuals that have seared painful memories into the collective psyche (there's that Ms Cole miming link again). So turning that deplorable record around has to be a major goal of the new management team.

So far, as mentioned, the heather is not aflame, and we are still waiting to see if the Lennon Revolution will spark into life at some point. There was some desultory banner waving when the Daily Fascist (or Daily Express as its otherwise known) claimed that Charlton’s Nick Bailey and Egyptian star Mohammed 'Gedo' Nagy had slipped through Lennon’s pudgy fingers. Bailey preferred the heady fleshpots of Middlesbrough, Strachan outbidding Celtic with an astonishing £1.5m super-offer, while Nagy's club Ittihad failed to be impressed by Celtic’s standard “can we borrow him for a wee bit” negotiation tactic. " Celtic had offered £600,000 for a loan deal to see if he could settle in Scotland but that will not happen now,” said Ittihad’s chairman Mohammed Moselhi, and thus Nagy ended up at local rivals Al-Alhy for £800,000, some players, and a rather curious looking lamp. Outbid by a club from Egypt. The half-hearted street disturbances petered out and the rain soaked mob shuffled off home; the Revolution was postponed.

Celtic were put off by yet another failure of their Borrowers routine, a few days later according to the press Lennon was trying to secure the services of Everton’s injury-plagued striker, James Vaughan, although Bolton Wanderers were reported to be front runners as they were willing to actually sign the player (the cheats). Pulses were firmly in the safe zone following the news that Celtic were rumoured to be after £2 million-rated Scunthorpe striker Gary Hooper, Sunderland’s Daryl Murphy and almost inevitably, Anthony Stokes of Hibernian. Nothing substantial though, late June and not one confirmed signing. The tension crept through the streets like a large duck with a limp, it was only a matter of time before the Revolution really kicked off, any day now. Not even the news that Charlie Mulgrew was certain to return to the club, or that Sol Campbell still hadn’t managed to escape from his cell below Kerrydale Street, was enough to set flame to dry tinder; Mulgrew is a reasonable SPL player but nothing more, while no one really believes the whole Campbell saga.

Campbell is an odd one I have to admit. If the press is to believed Celtic are willing to shell out the kind of wage last enjoyed by the likes of Bobo Balde, however it would still be far below the filthy lucre Campbell could sweep up at Arsenal. What would Celtic really have to offer? The mind-numbing drudgery of the SPL? The chance of work for a rookie coach? It can’t be Europe as we have a mayfly like existence in that arena now that we are firmly entrenched in the slow lane. Unless Campbell has a yet unmentioned yearning to drink regularly in Sauchiehall Street, it’s difficult to fathom out what constitutes Celtic’s sales pitch. Davie Hay reckoned that Lawwell might be pitching the club as the footballing equivalent of the Sunnyview Retirement Home: “I don't think I'm being disrespectful when I say his best days are probably behind him considering he is now in his mid-30s. However, it is the SPL he is coming to play in and Davie Weir has shown at Rangers that you can still be an important player to the Old Firm and still perform to a high standard even when you are at the latter stages of your career.” In other words, even an aged crock like Campbell would stand head and shoulders above the SPL dross – what an advertisement for Scottish football.

The end of June saw the club linked with more players than you could shake a dead snake at, yet this wasn’t so much a revolution as a continuation of the limited ambition policies of previous regimes. The BBC revealed that “Celtic are in talks with South Korean World Cup defender Cha Du-Ri, who is available under freedom of contract”, after a rather unsuccessful spell with 1 Bundesliga strugglers Freiburg where he was nicknamed “the human weapon”. We’re hoping that’s an accurate translation. Du-Ri had been singled out as the weak link in the South Korean World Cup defence, however he certainly has had plenty of experience in the Bundesliga, albeit with mixed success. Still, it was a signing, an actual one, and not just another “thanks but no thanks, Neil” encounter, as with 23-year-old Cardiff City and Wales midfielder, Joe Ledley, who must have been well out of Celtic’s range after Cardiff rejected bids of £5m and £6m from Stoke City.  (note: I just realised the Stoke bids were two years ago and Ledley is in fact a free agent.  Latest reports are that talks have reopened.. free agent? That's us in then).

If players were hardly flocking to Celtic Park carried aloft by peasant workers singing songs of liberation, they were starting to head in the opposite direction, heads hanging low in the traditional manner of despised counter-revolutionaries. Strachan announced confidently that Stephen McManus’ loan arrangement would be transformed into permanent deal, snarling “Stephen wants to be here and we want him to be here,” while mobs failed to spontaneously appear crying for the bold Stephen to change his mind. Also heading south was the invisible son of Nippon, Koki Mizuno. When he signed under Celtic’s “Asian Markets” strategy (also known as “just sign someone, anyone, and let’s hope it shifts some shirts”) Mizuno was hailed as the greatest thing to come out of Japan since Henati porn. Unfortunately despite one or two glimpses of something, Mizuno failed to make any impact, last playing for the club in August 2009. Let’s face it, if you couldn’t get into Mowbray’s team then it’s time to do the honourable thing.

Another Asian Market Strategy signing, Zheng Zhi, also exited stage left, incredibly though the club actually managed to get some cash in return! Guangzhou Evergrande handed over $736,000 for Zhi’s signature ending another unsuccessful spell for a Far East player at Celtic. Shunsuke Nakamura aside, Celtic has a singular knack for signing Asian players who arrive to a fanfare of high expectation and then vanish into reserve football obscurity after a brief appearance. Given the club’s obvious policy of signing players to tap into potential markets (who then remain annoyingly oblivious), it can only be a matter of time before another Japanese player arrives at Celtic, with a Chinese colleague hot on his heels and maybe a favourite son of Indonesia if the club gets lucky. We’ve got the Korean market sewn up now so we’ve not need to recruit further on that front.

I’m not sure what the Guinean market is like, however the answer is probably irrelevant as the arrival of Ibrahima Camara on trial has more to do with the boxes the player ticks:

1. His surname is “Camara” and there is an old charter which compels Celtic to try and sign every player born with that surname.
2. He’s a free agent and we’re cheapskates.
3. He helped his previous team to relegation (a running theme in Celtic’s employment criteria)

Camara is viewed as a possible replacement for Landy N'Guemo after Celtic failed to reach an agreement with French club, AS Nancy. The French thought Celtic should pay a reasonable amount, £1.8m being reasonable to the French, and Celtic thought they shouldn’t, refusing to up their offer of £1.2m. “I left with the impression that I’d be back at Celtic next season and that it would all be sorted while I was at the World Cup,” a disappointed N’Guemo sobbed to the Evening Times. “I know the manager rated me also. The last thing Neil Lennon said to me before I left for the World Cup was: ‘You’ve done really well here’”. Nicolas Holveck, sporting director of AS Nancy, confirmed Celtic’s mean shattering of poor Landy’s dreams, also revealing that Celtic had inquired about Alfred N’Diaye, the club’s highy rated defensive midfield player. Now let’s play spot the deal breaker here shall we? Holveck reveals the following facts about N’Diaye and any possible move:

1. AS Nancy would be looking for no less than £2.5m.
2. The French have ruled out any possibility of a loan deal.
3. Several English clubs have also cast an interested eye over the player.

Any one of those would be enough to scupper a deal, all three together means that Dermot Desmond will be caught giving alms to the poor of the parish before N’Diaye is paraded at Celtic Park holding aloft a green and white scarf.

The remainder of the transfer speculation ranges from the unlikely to the fearful. Lennon has indicated that the seemingly certain departure of the very disappointing Edson "honestly I really played for Bayern Munich" Braafheid may not take place, but he is willing to listen to offers for Celtic’s only sellable assets; Artur Boruc and Aiden McGeady. The club are obviously hoping that Boruc and McGeady can be punted for a combined total of £300m, or when the brandy isn’t flowing in the boardroom around £15m. Every penny of course will be handed to Neil Lennon to strength the team, except for all the cash that isn’t. Far more unlikely, but even more welcome should it come to pass, Giorgos “Greek Tragedy” Samaras has been linked with a £2m move to....... nah go on guess, well done, it was easy wasn’t it? Yes, Middlesbrough and Gordon “Rag and Bone Man” Strachan.

Unfortunately any hope that Samaras may be absent from Paradise next season may have been dashed by paradoxically the one signing so far that has been a huge boost to Celtic’s league chances, and the club wasn’t even involved. Kris Boyd’s move to Middlesbrough looks to have scuppered Tragedy's departure, and also deprives Rangers of their main, and near enough only, goal threat. So even if Lennon’s Revolution turns out to be damp squib, then we may pull of a Strachan and win the league by being not as bad as they are. Isn’t that something to look forward to? No, there’s no pleasing some people.

Quite where in this litany of journeymen approaches, failed negotiations and moderately interesting signings we can find the shinning heart of Lennon’s Revolution is anyone’s guess. It seems to this observer, I was going to say “objective” but I would be lying, that far from a revolution we’ve just seen little more than a cabinet reshuffle with the previous policies remaining firmly in place. Maybe that will be enough to win the SPL as Rangers sink into the mire, but it won’t be the popular revolution we longed for, and won’t bring back the Disappeared to Celtic Park.

A continuation of limited ambition will not restore the club’s battered reputation or make European participation anything other than a fly by night experience, not unless Lennon really is a genius of epic proportions. As I said though, there are a few weeks yet before the season starts, and a couple more before the transfer windows closes, so we may see that radical change of direction hinted at by Peter Lawwell in the aftermatch of the Mowbray Debacle. I truly hope so, as what we’ve seen so far is about as revolutionary as a particularly quiet meeting of the local Rotary Club when the scones are passed round.

STOP PRESS: Arise ye starvlings from your slumbers, the Revolution is here! Celtic are leading the chase for Mexico’s World Cup sensation (it says here) Pablo “Dynamite” Barrera! Yes we’re in the chase with Everton and West Ham who have both made £5m offers according to The Sun! Hold on.. £5m? Damn. Wait though, there’s someone else mentioned, hopefully it’ll be another World Cup star who will set Paradise alight with his silky skills, now, let’s see….oh no… George Boateng.. free agent… previous club relegated… not very good. Welcome to Celtic, George.