Hatate injury could be a blessing in disguise come next summer

It’s news we could have been doing without, when Brendan Rodgers relayed the message that Reo Hatate would be out for a significant amount of time yet again, following a calf injury which kept him out of the side since our trip to Pittodrie in August.

The Celtic boss admitted it could be another while yet until we see Reo in the thick of action and battling in a Celtic jersey after a nasty grade four hamstring injury.

He had been slowly but surely building back up to his old self again; using his wicked touch and vision on the field to help carve open our opponents. Now it looks as though we’ll have to do without the wonderful ingenuity of the wee man for the foreseeable.

As has already been discussed on The Celtic Star, it gives others a chance to shine and really take the bull by the horns. Bernardo has looked half-decent and it would be good to see Iwata in that sitting position with Callum pushed further forward – where in this writer’s humble opinion is our captain’s best suited position.

Despite the doom and gloom surrounding the bitter blow to Reo yet again, it could be an indirect bonus come next summertime. Think, for a second, if you will, about the form of Matt O’Riley and how that will be attracting interest from big clubs in big leagues – particularly down in the English Premier League – and how Reo Hatate had been said to be courting interest too this summer before the window closed.

The interest was firm enough that Hatate himself indicated to the Parkhead powerbrokers that he wished to wait until the transfer window was actually closed before signing a new deal with improved terms.

Now that that is done and dusted it gives us that little bit more security, however, if he performs well enough and to the standard where he’s turning it on in European competition, then we all know it becomes nigh on impossible to keep hold of our assets.

It happened with Moussa and it happened with French Eddy and we were helpless to do anything about it. Once their heads were turned it was a case of trying to get the best deal possible so that we can reinvest in their respective replacements and the team more generally.

It’s not only exclusive to those two as we know, as Celtic’s conveyor belt of young talent throughout the past decade has netted us a small fortune along the way.

Which brings me to the point; Reo’s successive injuries, whilst terrible for the player and does harm the team, means that other teams won’t see him play or dominate in the UEFA Champions League group stages like Matt O’Riley has.

It’s bad enough that Matty could be depart next summer leaving us another step back because of a lack of succession planning this campaign, but if Reo had been fit and firing since the get-go, we could be looking at losing both players come the summer transfer window of 2024.

Of course it could still happen that they both depart because you just never know. It does make it that bit more unlikely though as he will have missed a significant chunk of the season and also the most high profile games in European competition.

Sad as it is to admit, it’s small mercies that you try and cling to in these situations and this newest blow could just be a blessing in disguise for the Hoops supporters next year.

Paul Gillespie

Matt Corr’s new book Majic, Stan and the King of Japan is out now and Neil Lennon, the Celtic captain that season, has written the foreword for us.

You can get a signed copy of the hardback version direct from Celtic Star Books by clicking on the image below. It’s also available an an e-book via Amazon Kindle and please note that all colour photographs that appear in the beautifully presented printed hardback book are also available in the Kindle version of Majic, Stan and the King of Japan…