It’s over. The dream of Champions League nights at Parkhead, at least for this season, has evaporated into the cool Kazakh air. Celtic are eliminated from Europe’s top competition at the play-off stage, defeated 3-2 on a heart-stopping penalty shootout by Kairat Almaty after 210 minutes of goal-free, grindhouse football through two games.
For the thousands who traveled and the millions who slept late at home, the result is like a punch in the gut. The immediate question on everyone’s lips, Are Celtic out of the Champions League? has been answered in the most brutal fashion imaginable. Yes, they are. The fallout will be immense, with fingers already pointing towards a frustrating summer transfer window that left the squad looking thin and unprepared for a challenge of this magnitude.
Daizen Maeda, whose boundless energy has been a defining feature of his fight-hardened approach, will always be haunted by this draw. He squandered a gilt-edged chance to be the hero towards the close of normal time, only to have his game-winning spot-kick blocked in the shootout. Adam Idah and Luke McCowan saw their penalties saved as well, cementing Celtic’s fate.
So, the next question is an immediate and pressing one: Do Celtic go into the Europa League? Yes, that is the consolation prize. But as the dejected players fell to the turf at the Almaty Central Stadium, it would have felt like a hollow victory. A place in the Europa League group stage is secured, but the £20 million jackpot of the Champions League is gone.
Kajrat – Celtic: Are Celtic out of the Champions League?
Let’s be honest, over the two legs, Celtic FC simply weren’t good enough. You can talk about possession, and Celtic had plenty of it (67% in the second leg), but possession doesn’t win you football matches. Goals do. And Brendan Rodgers’ side looked utterly toothless.
FC Kairat Almaty UEFA ranking is lowly 311th in Europe by UEFA, but they came with a simple game plan: stay compact, frustrate, and stifle. And they executed it to perfection. They were robust, organised, and while they offered very little going forward themselves, they knew they didn’t have to. The onus was on Celtic to break them down, and it was a test they failed spectacularly.
The first half was a familiar story of sterile domination. Passes went sideways, movement was labored, and the final ball was always missing. The one moment of note was when a header from James Forrest was tipped over the bar, a brief flash of threat amidst an ocean of mediocrity. The sloppiness was infectious; easy passes went awry, and threatening attacks dissipated through a moment’s indecision or a bad touch.
The second half brought more of the same until the 86th minute—the moment. Callum McGregor, one of the few players who can hold his head high, split the Kairat defence with a perfectly weighted pass. Daizen Maeda was clean through. This was it, the chance to exorcise the demons of the first leg and send the travelling fans into raptures. Instead, with the goal gaping, he blazed his shot high over the crossbar. You could almost feel the collective groan from Glasgow to Almaty. It was the kind of miss that screamed, “This is not our night.”
Extra time was a war of attrition. Celtic pushed, forcing a few scrambling saves from the Kairat keeper, but that cutting edge, that little bit of magic, was nowhere to be found. And so, to the dreaded lottery of penalties. It felt almost inevitable, a grim conclusion to a tie where Celtic FC never truly looked like scoring.
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🇰🇿 HISTORIC NIGHT IN ALMATY!
Kairat defeat Celtic and advance to the UEFA Champions League group stage! pic.twitter.com/qy4CBUrQqT— Kazakhstan Football Scout🇰🇿 (@scout_kazakh) August 26, 2025
So where did it all go so wrong? This exit wasn’t just about 120 minutes in Kazakhstan. Its roots lie in the weeks of inaction in the transfer market. As former Celt Mark Wilson put it, “Did the Celtic board gamble on the players that they’ve got to get them through? It’s backfired dramatically, and they pay the price.”
Fans have been chanting ‘Sack the Board’ for weeks, frustrated at the lack of investment following the long-term injury to Jota and the sale of key players. The squad that took the field last night was crying out for creativity, for a winger with pace and trickery to unlock a stubborn defence. Yet, the reinforcements never arrived. To fail to prepare is to prepare to fail, and Celtic’s hierarchy has learned this lesson the hard way.
Brendan Rodgers’ post-match comments were telling. “It’s a huge blow for us,” he admitted, the disappointment etched on his face. “We want to be in the Champions League, we aren’t… We’ve missed a massive opportunity across these two games.” He knows that the club’s ambition to build on last season’s impressive European run has been torpedoed before it even began.
Do Celtic Drop into Europa League? What Comes Next After Celtic out of Champions League?
As the dust settles, the reality of the situation will begin to sink in. Celtic FC does drop into the Europa League, a prestigious competition in its own right, but the financial disparity is stark. The club has missed out on an estimated £20 million in revenue – a sum that could have transformed the remainder of the transfer window. Now, will the board loosen the purse strings out of desperation, or will they tighten them further now that the main prize is gone? That remains to be seen.
The psychological impact on the squad cannot be underestimated either. To be knocked out by what captain Callum McGregor bluntly called “a very average team” is a sobering moment. This isn’t just a loss; it’s an embarrassment.
And there is no time to feel sorry for themselves. Football is relentless. Up next? The first Old Firm derby of the season is at Ibrox this Sunday. The pressure, already immense, has just been dialled up to eleven. A poor performance against Rangers could see the simmering fan frustration boil over the club. This week could well define Celtic’s entire season, and it has started in the worst possible way.
