Celtic’s policy of chaos in the transfer market

The final few hours of the transfer window are upon us and it looks like a third underwhelming window in succession.

It seems Celtic will complete their business with four loan deals and a possibly permanent transfer. Junior Adamu has joined from Freiburg – the striker has scored two goals in 18 games this season, adding to the four he bagged in 27 appearances last term. Adamu joins another new temporary striker at Paradise – Tomas Cvancara – who has scored 7 goals in the last two years. Although, Cvancara has made a great impact with a goal and assist in his first two games in the Hoops. At the other end of the park, the Celts have got Julián Araujo until the end of the season – a player who barely featured at AFC Bournemouth but looks sharp in Glasgow. Meanwhile, Benjamin Arthur – a 20 year old defender with just three senior appearances to his name at Brentford – looks set to sign until the end of the season. He will join the likes of Dane Murray, Stephen Welsh and Simpson Pusey as squad rotators behind Scales and Trusty. A deal in the region of £4m for Joel Mvuka, a winger from FC Lorient, was also reported to have been agreed. However, there has been speculation that the move could be in doubt due to a possible failed medical.

It is now a full year since Celtic sold Kyogo and several months since Adam Idah left the club. Two poor windows have gone by and we are in the midst of the closest title race for some time – with Champions League qualifiers on the line and the associated cash windfall that Celtic could get from that instead of Hearts or Rangers capitalising. There is £77m in the bank and yet this is a patchwork window.

The transfer policy at Celtic seems to be all over the place. Indeed, the model was supposed to be one of player trading, whereby you’d buy cheap, develop and sell. However, that policy has been undermined by the club failing to sell Maeda and his peak value in the summer, when the player wanted to go and was initially told that he could do so. The move didn’t happen because Celtic weren’t prepared with replacements. Not only has Maeda’s value now plummeted as a result, but his performances have too. Now, in the very next window, Celtic find themselves refusing bids of £25m for Arne Engels, who has not set Parkhead on fire since his arrival in 2024. He has been steady, but £14m profit on the club’s investment would be prime time to sell and reinvest in the team with two real quality players to take us to the next level. Instead, the bid is knocked back because the club have not invested in the team and the midfield is devoid of quality, with no time left to replace Engels. They have not learned from the Maeda error and have lost out on millions to enhance the team, which is the opposite of the purpose of their model.

On the other hand, the model has been ruthlessly adhered to when it comes to selling Kyogo, Kuhn and Idah.Therefore, it is puzzling how some players go and others can’t. Surely, it’s a case of either keeping hold of your best players to build and maintain a strong team, or sell at peak value to reinvest the profit on better players. Doing things by half doesn’t work, as seen by the regression in the quality of the squad, despite huge sums in the bank.

It seems that there now is no policy, other than waiting to the end of the window, scrambling for players and not being prepared for the selling and reinvesting model that we are meant to operate. When sales happen players aren’t suitably replaced either.

If you go back a decade to the squad that the invincible treble winning team had at Celtic, then it is clear that we were ten times better than we are today. Yet, record profits have been made since then, so one wonders what is the direction of our transfer business if we have brought in such money and yet got far weaker over the years. Ha we build on Brendan’s first team, we could be a competitive force in Europe. Instead, we are part of a poor three horse title race, with a budget that dwarfs the other horses; while underperforming in Europe regularly.

This transfer chaos cannot continue.