Celtic are to head to Japan for a pre-season friendly this close season as Ange Postecoglou returns to his old stomping ground. After hitting Australia and capitalising on Ange’s connection and popularity over that side of the world, it looks like the club are eager to head on another profile-raising jaunt in Asia.
According to a report in Nikkan Sports, Ange will return to the J-League to play his old club Yokohama F. Marinos, who will face-off against Pep Guardiola and his Manchester City side too. As of yet, nothing has been finalised in terms of whether all these teams will play against one another in a group like the Aussie tour or if it will be just the Marinos game for the Hoops.
With a raft of Japanese signings, like Kyogo Furuhashi, Daizen Maeda, Reo Hatate, and the now departed Yosuke Ideguchi, the Bhoys have a strong base of Asian imports that play a starring role in this current Celtic team, although Ideguchi is back home on-loan in the J-League following an unsuccessful spell. Likewise, we also have South Korean Hyeongyu Oh on the books too who hails from that part of the footballing universe.
It would another masterstroke from the Celtic heirarchy if they manage to get this off the ground and running for real. The success of the Ange Homecoming Tour was unprecedented for the Hoops coffers and another foray into the potential money-making revenue streams of Asia won’t be a bad thing heading forward. With Manchester City a potential opponent too, it would be great to test ourselves against the best in Britain again too.
Manchester United 2.0 anybody?
Paul Gillespie
