Celtic have reportedly rejected a second bid from Lech Poznań for Luis Palma, with the Polish club’s latest offer of around €2.3m still falling short of what the Hoops are willing to accept – and with Sevilla now lurking in the background, this one is heating up.
As reported by 67HailHail on X, Celtic have turned down another approach for the Honduran winger, with Lech Poznań’s pursuit of a permanent deal continuing to hit a wall. Polish and Central American football coverage – relayed through Football Insider and Futbol Centroamérica – indicates that Lech’s first offer came in at roughly €1.5m, which Celtic dismissed immediately, before the Poles returned with a second bid in the region of €2.3m. That one’s gone the same way.
Celtic’s reported asking price sits at around £2.6m – which, let’s be honest, is already a compromise. We paid Aris Thessaloniki approximately £3.5m for Palma back in the summer of 2023, so any sale at that level would represent a loss on our initial outlay. The fact that we’re apparently willing to stomach that tells you something about where Palma sits in Brendan Rodgers’ long-term thinking.
Luis arrived with genuine excitement – a direct, pacey left winger brought in to fill the void left by Jota’s departure – and he delivered some bright moments, particularly in European qualifying. But his time at Celtic has been stop-start, and last season he spent the campaign on loan at Lech Poznań. By all accounts he did well enough in Poland that the club have made signing him permanently a priority. That’s a decent endorsement of the player, even if it hasn’t translated into an acceptable offer yet.
Lech are a credible enough destination – a well-run Polish Ekstraklasa club with European ambitions – but let’s not pretend they carry the kind of pull that would make Celtic feel any real urgency to do them a favour on price. Two bids under the asking price, with the gap still meaningful, suggests Lech are testing our resolve rather than genuinely pushing to get the deal done at a fair value. Celtic holding firm here is the right call, full stop.
Where it gets more interesting is the reported involvement of Sevilla. Regional Central American outlets have name-checked the Spanish side as potential suitors, and if there’s any substance to that, Celtic’s bargaining position improves considerably. A club of Sevilla’s stature entering the picture – even speculatively – changes the dynamic entirely and could push the fee back closer to what we actually paid for him.
I’d be honest with you, though – this feels like a player whose Celtic career is effectively over, regardless of how the fee negotiations resolve. With a significant squad overhaul anticipated this summer, and incoming targets likely to reshape the wide positions, finding a buyer at close to the right number matters more than holding out indefinitely for a player who isn’t in Rodgers’ plans. Football Insider called the reduced asking price “baffling” – but recouping £2.6m on a player no longer in the picture beats getting nothing at all.
Don’t let Lech get him on the cheap, though. Hold the line, wait for Sevilla to show their hand, and get as close to that £2.6m mark as possible. We’ve done it the patient way before. Mon The Hoops.
