  Galactic novae and supernovae can be studied by utilizing historical
observations, yielding explosion time, location on sky~etc. Recent publications
by Hoffmann & Vogt present CVs, supernova remnants, planetary nebulae etc. as
potential counterparts based on their list of historically reported transients
from the Classical Chinese text corpus. Since their candidate selection
neglects the state-of-the-art (e.g. Stephenson \& Green), and since it includes
`broom stars' and `fuzzy stars', i.e. probable comets, we investigate their
catalogue in more detail. We discuss here their two highlights, the suggestion
of two `broom star' records dated AD 667 and 668 as one historical supernova
and of the `guest star' of AD 891 as recurrent nova U Sco. The proposed
positional search areas are not justified due to translation and dating
problems, source omission, as well as misunderstandings of historical Chinese
astronomy and unfounded textual interpretations. All sources together provide
strong evidence for comet sightings in both AD 668 and 891 -- e.g., there are
no arguments for stationarity. The AD 667 record is a misdated doublet of 668.
Our critique pertains more generally to their whole catalogue of `24 most
promising events': their speculations on counterparts lack a solid foundation
and should not be used in follow-ups.
