Celtic FC Women – Prudence versus ambition, the story so far

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The Celtic Star

·21 November 2025

Celtic FC Women – Prudence versus ambition, the story so far

Celtic FC women’s team was founded in 2007 when the Celtic took over Arsenal North LFC. Playing essentially amateur football, it took a number of years before the club was in a position to challenge for silverware. Celtic’s first ever trophy came in the League cup in 2010, defeating Spartans 4-1 in the final with a promising team that was packed full of young, talented players.

These players however were subsequently cherry-picked by the likes of Glasgow City and Hibernian who were the dominant forces in the Scottish game. So Celtic after a promising start with player development essentially regressed.

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Celtic FC Women, League Cup winners in 2010.

As we mentioned on The Celtic Star last Friday ahead of the SWPL1 Glasgow Derby against theRangers Women at Ibrox, their new manager Leanne Crichton actually played in that 2010 League Cup winning side fifteen years ago before starring for Glasgow City, playing in England for Notts County in the WSL and winning 72 caps for Scotland.

Numerous players passed through Celtic’s fingertips only to on to become established international players elsewhere as Celtic continually took a step forward then two back. The Celtic Women’s team featured in two consecutive League Cup finals in 2018 and 2019, losing both, the second embarrassingly so. The only positive thing you could say about it is that while not scoring themselves they prevented Hibs reach double figures – just!

Celtic manager Fran Alonso celebrates his sides Champions League qualification during a Scottish Women’s Premier League match between Motherwell and Celtic at Penny Cars Stadium on June 06, 2021. (Photo by Craig Foy / SNS Group)

It’s possibly fair to argue that Celtic as a football club didn’t start to take the women’s game seriously until a decade after that first and only trophy win when Fran Alonso was recruited as the new Head Coach in 2020. Alonso had worked his way up from doing some cleaning work while running a girls youth team on the south coast of England to working for both Southampton and Everton in the EPL, on the coaching staff of both Ronald Koeman and Mauricio Pochettino.

During the covid period the women’s league in Scotland was suspended and crucially were also prevented from training. However as Glasgow City were involved in European football they alone were allowed to continue to train. Celtic’s first game back was against City and Alonso lost that one narrowly. His side had only a few days training all year and by the final day of the campaign Alonso needed theRangers to beat Glasgow City and his promising Celtic side to take care of Motherwell with 1Bet.com offering extremely generous odds on Celtic hitting double figures that day, which they almost did with a fine 9-0 win.

Celtic manager Fran Alonso (L) celebrates his sides Champions League Qualification with Celtic’s Chloe Warrington during a Scottish Women’s Premier League match between Motherwell and Celtic at Penny Cars Stadium on June 06, 2021, in Airdrie, Scotland (Photo by Craig Foy / SNS Group)

Not for the first time theRangers would lose the Glasgow City on the final day of the season, results that would deny Celtic a first ever SWPL title. In December 2021 Alonso’s Celtic side, now packed with quality arrivals like Jacynta, Caitlin Hayes and Clarisa Larisey beat Glasgow City in the League Cup Final at Firhill with a sizeable Celtic support in the stadium.

Jacynta in action for Celtic. Photo AJ (The Celtic Star)

Celtic had never won the Scottish Cup but at the end of that season, in May 2022, that changed when despite an early red card, Celtic beat Glasgow City to the silverware in a brilliant final with the Ghirls thoroughly deserving their 3-2 win after extra time at Tynecastle.

A year later Alonso’s exciting Celtic team were breaking their own attendance records with 15,822 supporters attending the title run in match against Glasgow City at Celtic Park which the Ghirls won convincingly.

But on the last day of the season Celtic had to beat Hearts at Celtic Park – which they did comfortably enough – but had to await the outcome of the result at Ibrox. If theRangers won they could have been champions, but a draw would mean that the title would be Celtic’s. With the game goalless, theRangers team threw caution to the wind and ended up conceding on the counter deep into stoppage time.

The trophy was already in a taxi from Hampden on its way to Celtic Park only to be diverted. The drama wasn’t over though as theRangers had the ball in the City net seconds later – with a huge cheer going up at Celtic Park – but the goal was ruled out for a foul on the Glasgow City keeper. Celtic had lost the title on goal difference, something Alonso vowed to avoid happening again.

A week later Celtic were back at Hampden for the Scottish Cup Final against theRangers and Alonso’s side, backed by a large Celtic support of around 7000, in a crowd of just over 10,000 won more comfortably than the 2-0 scoreline suggests.

So by this stage Alonso had take the SWPL to the final day each season, won the League Cup and the Scottish Cup twice and also enjoyed a great winning record over theRangers in general. Around Christmas 2023 Fran was offered the Houston Dash job in the States, and the chance to manage in the biggest and best women’s league in world football was too good to turn down, with Celtic receiving a sizeable compensation fee from the American side.

However his parting gift to Celtic was the astonishing goal difference advantage he left for the new manager Elena Sadiku and five months later the title was once again determined not on points but came down to goal difference and partly thanks to Fran Alonso’s massive goal haul in the first half of the season, Celtic FC Women were Champions of Scotland for the first time ever!

Amy Gallacher’s goal won the SWPL1 title for Celtic. Photo AJ (The Celtic Star)

So new manager Elena Sadiku therefore became Celtic’s first SWPL1 winning coach, thanks to a dramatic last minute winner by Amy Gallacher against Hibs at Celtic Park on May 2024. That took Celtic into the Champions League via the Champions route and the Swedish coach did very well to negotiate her way through some tough play-off rounds to reach he group stages where her Celtic team played top level European club football against the likes of Chelsea, Real Madrid and FC Twente. Celtic picked up around £400k from this European progression to the group stages of the Champions League.

Amy Gallacher with the trophy. Photo AJ (The Celtic Star)

But last season ended poorly with Celtic struggling to secure fourth spot and Hibs actually winning the title. Sadiku’s cup record has been very poor indeed and she has also an unfortunate habit of failing to win matches against the better sides in the SWPL. Last Friday despite Celtic dominating the first half of a Glasgow Derby at Ibrox, her side instead of being a few goals ahead went in level at 1-1 and ended up losing the match 3-2. Her record against theRangers in particular is frankly, terrible.

Elena Sadiku at Ibrox. theRangers v Celtic FC Women, 14 November 2025. Photo AJ (The Celtic Star)

The club has invested around £10m in a new training facility including a full size indoor pitch at Barrowfield but does not provide any direct financial backing to the Women’s team which must survive on its own steam via sponsorship deals, player trading with fees received for the likes of Larisey and Hayes – both Alonso signings and also from Fran’s move to America. The Celtic squad is clearly not as strong as before and while Sadiku appears to be making a decent impact on the training ground her big game record is a real cause for concern.

The Barrowfield investment suggests that Celtic aim to be a hub for the best developing talent coming through in the Scottish game and there’s plenty of logic in that for the long term. Celtic FC Women has been drawn against theRangers in the semi-final of the League Cup, a fixture that will be played in early February 2026. Currently the side are in fourth place in the SWPL, exactly where they finished last season.

Alonso took Celtic to the last day in the title race every season he was in charge but the fourth place last season was a dramatic drop-off and this was followed by a clear-out of players at the end of last season and more left than arrived, hinting at why Elena Sadiku currently has young academy players filling her bench.