Marseille have confirmed the signing of Olivier Ntcham on a loan with an option to buy agreement with Celtic. The Ligue 1 club took to Twitter to confirm the signing of the 24-year-old, who is believed to have a buy-out fee of £4.5m, which may include add-ons.
Trading the 🍀 for the⚪🔵@OlivierNtcham est Olympien. Our newest midfielder joins from @CelticFC.
Welcome to Marseille, Olivier! pic.twitter.com/x9TVQQAvbq
— Olympique de Marseille 🇬🇧 🇺🇸 (@OM_English) February 1, 2021
The Frenchman joined from Manchester City for £4.5m in 2017. Although game time has been limited, now even more so with the emergence of Ismaila Soro and David Turnbull into the Celtic midfield.
The midfielder signed for Brendan Rodgers from City and has made 137 appearances, scoring 23 goals in a trophy laden period for the club. The player looks set to have played his last game for the club.
Marseille supporters have erupted in the last few days, forcing a game to be postponed after a group of fans broke into the training centre in protest of the club’s current failings. Ntcham was clearly that desperate to leave Celtic that he was willing to go to a club in such turmoil.
Ntcham looked desperate to leave and the fact that Celtic rejected a £13.5m deal from Porto last year for a player that looked to be keen on leaving seems madness now. Ntcham clearly disliked playing for the current manager and appears to have been working his ticket out of the club for 18 months.
Best of luck to the player in France.
