We need to talk about Matt O’Riley…
Celtic v Kilmarnock – Matt O Riley during the cinch Premiership match at Celtic Park, Saturday February 17, 2024. Photo Andrew Milligan
A number of players are quite rightly in the firing line at the moment due to our lacklustre performances on the park, and one name that is starting to have a few questions asked of him is Matt O’Riley.
Matt of course has arguably been our best player this campaign, he’s scored and assisted his fair share of goals and has improved greatly since last year, but he seems to have been dragged down by the rest of his teammates poor performances on the park.
Some will say it’s due to the bid that Atletico Madrid made for him late in the January transfer window. It’s only Natural that Matt could have his head turned by a bid from such a big name as Atletico, but has it affected his form or commitment on the park?
Could be just be going through a slump in form? Hopefully that’s all it is and he can shake it off as he’s a player of genuine quality who we will need to be at his best in the coming months ahead.
If Matt has ambitions of moving on to bigger things then he will need to buck up his ideas and start producing the form that made him a target for Diego Simone’s side in the first place.
More importantly we need him to kickstart his impressive form if we want to end the season with some form of silverware. Only then can Matt think about moving on to bigger things, he owes himself and more importantly the supporters just that.
The way he’s playing this side of the winter break isn’t getting him the move he looked set to achieve in the first half of this season when he was the best player in Scottish football. And Celtic getting upwards of £25m for the Denmark international midfielder might turn out to be pie in the sky on current form.
The way things are going at the moment for Matt, to paraphrase Tommy Docherty…
“Twenty-five million wouldn’t buy him.
“And I’m one of them.”
Just an Ordinary Bhoy
