Celtic's tumultuous season lurched to another low on Thursday night after receiving a 3-0 thrashing at the hands of Serie A side Roma in the Europa League.
The omens were ill from the first whistle, with hurried possession, panicked defending and positional uncertainty apparent throughout the Celtic team.
Then, Liam Scales banged in an own goal header from a Roma corner just six minutes in. It would've served as a highlight at the other end of the pitch, but ultimately set the tone for a difficult evening for Wilfried Nancy's side.
Roma outclassed and outplayed the home side, with a further two goals coming thanks to Evan Ferguson. Arne Engel's missed penalty deep into first-half stoppage time compounded Celtic's misery.
The Bhoys remain in the hunt for a knockout qualification place despite the defeat, but this was a night Nancy didn't want, or need, as he looks to establish his credibility in Glasgow. This was Celtic's heaviest defeat of the season.
Wilfried Nancy sticks with what he believes
Given the reaction and the outcry to the way his debut match against Hearts transpired, there was an element of bravery in Nancy's decision to go with the exact same starting eleven and 3-4-2-1 formation against a side of much higher quality.
Nancy promised nuances to what was already in place at Celtic, but the team is undoubtedly operating differently from the winning run that Martin O'Neill oversaw. The Frenchman is not for moving, and there will likely be much debate about this in another round of aftermath.
Like the goals conceded against Hearts, Scales' own goal could hardly be blamed on 'the system', but the way Roma carved through Celtic twice more appeared a direct result of players' unfamiliarity in their roles in and out of possession.
Roma set traps with their press, and the Bhoys stumbled into them more often than not when sloppily building out from the back. That they struggled to defend against slick, ruthless operators in this turnover setting comes as no great surprise, especially with a tactical overhaul to consider.
It's undeniable that the worries of whether Celtic have the players to function the way Nancy wants have merit. His end goal may be a desirable destination, but the pain to get there in the midst of such a busy schedule is a hard sell for concerned supporters.
Second half improvement - but was it real?
That the new Celtic manager made a raft of substitutions at half-time, three in total, also suggests that Nancy is figuring all of this out on the fly, too. He's still getting to know all of these players and what they are capable of.
Celtic's performance did improve from the 45th to the 70th minute or so, as a direct result of the manager's changes, but once a returning Kelechi Iheanacho's goal was ruled out for offside, the wind came out of the home side's sails again.
Celtic can't just be a team that starts playing at 3-0 down when the opposition are happy to shepherd a healthy lead home, so how real the improvement was can't really be assessed with conviction. They were thoroughly beaten in the game before any hint of positivity in performance.
This was a grim night all over, as much as Nancy might cling to these small green shoots of attacking fluency in his media duties post-match.
Celtic set-piece woes continue
Despite the new era and all the changes, Celtic still clash with the trends that have defined their season to this point. Roma's first goal is the fourth Celtic have conceded in the Europa League this season, one of the highest totals of all the 36 teams in the League Phase.
Celtic can't afford to have this soft underbelly even when confidence is high, and things are going well, but when it remains a weakness in this period of transition, it makes everything else feel much worse.
Celtic's woes with set pieces have been a notorious failing for years now. If Nancy could address this alongside all the other changes he is looking to enact, it would go long way to establishing popularity. But we shouldn't hold our breath here.
Bhoys still in the hunt
Despite all the negatives on the night, which included poor individual performances from the likes of Reo Hatate and Benjamin Nygren, Celtic still remain with a decent chance of qualification for the knockout phase.
A top-24 berth is needed. Celtic are just on the cusp of that after tonight's matches. While the trip to face Bologna in Italy next time out looks incredibly daunting, the home match against FC Utrecht - a team with just a single point from their matches to date - will be an opportunity to pick up a victory that could send them through with a bit of fortune elsewhere.
There's much work ahead of that, of course. Utrecht don't visit until the end of January.
More immediately, there's the small matter of a massive League Cup Final against St Mirren on Sunday. It couldn't be bigger for this team, their confidence and the credibility of the new man, Nancy. He badly needs that one to go well. Let's see what this team have within.
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