With a huge month ahead of Celtic including three vitally important matches against city rivals theRangers, not many have been focusing on the squad overhaul in front of Ange Postecoglou this summer, not yet anyway.
One thing for sure however is that the Australian will be nowhere near as busy during the off-season as he was last year, when he cleared the decks of most of the deadwood and released the notorious ‘wantaways’, as well as bringing in 12 new recruits who he has somehow managed to integrate into the squad while managing to keep Celtic in the hunt for all 3 domestic trophies.
One man who is casting an eye towards the summer however is Frank McAvennie, and having written many an article in the past bemoaning some of the nonsense he comes out with, this time I find myself actually starting to agree with the former Celtic striker. Talking about some of the players he can envisage Ange Postecoglou cutting loose at the end of the season he mentioned two in particular, Albian Ajeti and Mikey Johnston.
McAvennie said, as reported by Daily Record:
“One thing for sure –Albian Ajeti is out the window now. They have to get him out in the summer. He’s not going to get a game. He never got a game at West Ham so I thought when he came up here he’d have his work cut out.
“Mikey Johnston too. He has been a good servant, he’s a talented boy but he’s not done it in recent games. There will be another overhaul in the summer. If Mikey wants to stay then he really needs to step up before the end of the season. He should be relishing every chance he gets.
“The good thing is that this manager has given everyone a chance. Even wee Karamoko Dembele has come on a couple of times in the last few weeks. These boys need to look at Jota and Abada and James Forrest and realise that’s the standard they need to get to if they’re to have a future at Celtic.”
As I said before I have to agree with McAvennie on this. Albian Ajeti has been here a couple of seasons now and just hasn’t cut the mustard. He can’t complain he hasn’t had chances either, he has got game time under Neil Lennon, John Kennedy and Ange Postecoglou and has never looked to be ‘Celtic standard’ under any of them.
Before his latest injury he did look like he had at least lost a few pounds and had upped his fitness levels. When on the pitch under Ange he was definitely putting a shift in, something the manager requires as a minimum. Unfortunately however, for all his endeavour it didn’t change the fact that he just doesn’t seem to be at the level required to be anywhere near the starting eleven at Celtic.
Ajeti certainly has never justified the money we paid West Ham for him.
With Kyogo, Giakoumakis and Maeda all ahead of him in the pecking order it does seem like he is surplus to requirements at Parkhead. Hopefully we can recoup some sort of money on him, although the chances of getting back anywhere near what we paid for him are zero. I think the club would be overjoyed to even get half of our outlay back.
As for Mikey Johnston his situation may not be quite as black and white. As McAvennie rightly mentions, he’s definitely a talent, but for whatever reason we just haven’t managed to draw his full ability out of him yet. Mostly it has been down to the players horrendous bad luck with injuries. It seems like everytime he seems like he’s about to make that breakthrough his body lets him down again and he’s sidelined for another few weeks or months.
When he has had opportunities it is clear to see he is extremely talented, but at the same time there is clearly something missing that halts him from stepping up to that next level. Compared to the other wingers at our club he definitely lacks that goalscoring ability. When you look at Jota, Abada and even Forrest they are all players who provide a huge goal threat. Mikey doesn’t.
He has pace and can definitely beat a man but his final ball and decision making at crucial times is also lacking. You always feel like this could be improved by getting a run in the side but everytime he gets that opportunity it leads to another injury which must be as frustrating for the player as it is for us as fans who would love to see a homegrown talent like him reach his full potential. Ange Postecoglou has a big decision on his hands regarding the player in the summer.
Personally I would prefer he stayed a while longer to see if we could finally see him in full flight but I imagine Ange may have other ideas. Either way it will be interesting to see what the manager has up his sleeve in the future but he has a lot more important things to be focusing on before then!
Conall McGinty
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