Sky Sports pundit James McFadden has delivered a blunt assessment of Michel-Ange Balikwisha’s early days at Celtic, suggesting the Belgian wide man could already be slipping out of contention for a regular starting role…
Michel-Ange Balikwisha. theRangers v Celtic,31 August 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
After the recent league fixtures against theRangers and Kilmarnock, the former Scotland international remarked that the new recruit doesn’t appear suited to playing on either flank in Brendan Rodgers’ system.
Balikwisha – who arrived from Royal Antwerp for £4.5 million at the end of August – was thrown into the Glasgow derby before featuring again Killie at Rugby Park last weekend. In both outings he struggled to make an impact, leaving supporters and analysts disappointed with his contribution.
In comparison, Sebastian Tounekti – who spoke to The Celtic Star at Tuesday’s fan media conference – has caught the eye on the left wing. The Tunisian international impressed with his direct approach, casting further doubt on Balikwisha’s place in the squad given they play in the same position.
Michel–Ange Balikwisha ahead of kick-off. theRangers v Celtic,31 August 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
Speaking on Open Goal, McFadden said: “I don’t know what they’re going to do on the right. Is Iheanacho going to come in with Maeda on the right hand side? I think so, because I don’t think Balikwisha will be seen on the right again. And he’s not going to play on the left, because Tounekti looks really good.”
“So I would imagine that Maeda will go to the right, Iheanacho will play as the striker, and you’ve got that stretching of the game.”
Michel-Ange Balikwisha at Rugby Park, Kilmarnock v Celtic, 14 September 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
McFadden’s criticisms are valid. However, Balikwisha has only played two games and is settling into a new environment so it’s important he is given time to adjust to new surroundings. The first in the most hostile of surroundings and the second on an astroturf surface in atrocious weather conditions while playing out of position – he’s really a left winger.
Brendan Rodgers at yesterday’s media conference said that Daizen Maeda will be a striker or played out left, and Balikwisha will not be used on the right wing either. Perhaps we’ll see Tounekti playing on the right side of the Celtic attack?
Michel-Ange Balikwisha at Rugby Park, Kilmarnock v Celtic, 14 September 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
However, despite Rodgers taking responsibility for Balikwisha playing out of position, this stems back to recruitment. Celtic did not sign a right-winger in the summer. The only natural two wide men on the right hand side at the club are James Forrest and Yang.
That means Rodgers will have to play someone out of position for majority of the first half of the season. It’s now up to the manager to find solutions but to be put in that position with the amount of money in the bank is a complete farce. We should not stop calling out the summer transfer failings.
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How we have ended up with the farce that went on and created within our attacking areas, remains a guessing game, but hardly convincing regardless imo.
No evidence on show to suggest Nicholson, Tisdale and Rodgers have been able to work properly, in what has been finalised in our squad building process.
Unbalanced seems as an understatement within our attacking areas.
5 strikers in place, with Maeda likely to play through the centre now.
Yang and forrest as our right attacking options remains uninspiring, especially without a definite right midfielder behind and no AJ available.
So our left side is looking at being our far more creative side for ourselves, where balikwisha is going to have to produce, maybe more so from the subs bench for the time being.
Believe balikwisha was bought as a flexible attacking option, which would be very beneficial for ourselves, but Rodgers seems to have dismissed that option already now, by the sounds of things.
Having potentially 9 attacking options in place within our squad, might sound impressive on paper for ourselves.
But with it so Unbalanced, is a ridiculous state of affairs, no matter how you try to dress it up imo?
With that level of Unbalanced, we are still possibly in a situation where if injuries were too have any impact within our attacking options, then we could be all over the place within our attacking options.
Still could be a case of whether we could develop shin into a right attacking option for ourselves?
Our coaching staff would hardly breed confidence into you of that ever getting achieved.