TWO home-grown Celtic stars Kieran Tierney and Callum McGregor have been in the news over the weekend as speculation mounts about their futures at Celtic given interest from Arsenal and Leicester City respectively.
Arsenal have had a £15million bid for Kieran Tierney rejected already and there are reports that they have also had a second bid, this time for £20million knocked back by Celtic. We reported on Saturday evening that an ITK Arsenal fan believed that Celtic are looking for £40million. If Kieran decides that his future is away from Celtic then it will be a huge blow to the entire support. However, everyone would appreciate that he maybe wants to prove himself at the highest level as one of the finest left backs in the world.
Celtic have apparently made it clear that Callum McGregor is not for sale, despite reports of a £17.5million opening bid from Leicester City. Callum McGregor is perhaps the Celtic player our former manager admired the most and while he has a knowledge of the inner workings at Celtic, it will be the case that the opening bid is much lower than he’d be prepared to pay, if he’s going to tempt Celtic.
Now don’t misunderstand us here, we are NOT advocating a sale of either of these two brilliant players. Indeed we’d rather both are here to play a huge role in securing Ten in a Row and then if they want to go and play in a bigger league for much more money then they’d both go with the understanding of the support who’d wish both all the best.
But let’s say that Arsenal – or some other club – did offer £40million for KT and also let’s say Leicester City come back with a £25million bid for Calmac, whether accepted or not that’s £65million in revenue for the club from selling essentially two Academy players.
Motherwell Academy player David Turnbull should be a Celtic player by the time the plane takes off for Austria later today. The £3.25million transfer fee that the Fir Park will transform the club, their Chief Executive has stated. The fan-owned club will be able to pay off their debt to the former owner and secure the club’s future, which will have an emphasis on developing their own talent.
A few weeks ago Celtic announced plans to invest in the infrastructure at Barrowfield Training ground to complement the facilities at Lennoxtown. Celtic are to upgrade Barrowfield in order to create a new home for their women’s and academy teams.
The famous old training site, located near to Celtic Park, will include new refreshment and grandstand facilities for supporters. Celtic Women currently play their home games at K Park in East Kilbride, while reserve games are generally hosted at Greenock Morton’s Cappielow Park.
The club say the complex will also include one of the larger indoor football arenas in Scotland.
It will have a gym, two full-sized outdoor grass pitches, two artificial pitches, both indoor and outdoor, and an outdoor warm-up area. The first-team training base will remain at Lennoxtown, which was opened in 2007 12 miles from Celtic Park.
So from this we can see that Celtic, and indeed Motherwell have every reason to want to invest in their Academies.
A word of criticism on the women’s side, Celtic were slow to get their act together with regard to women’s football and as a result there was no Celtic players in the Scotland squad that played in the hugely successful World Cup in France that is on-going. These improved facilities at Barrowfield will assist the development of the Celtic’s Women’s side.
As it’s the start of the week a quick look ahead to what might or might not make the papers. One thing that won’t be happening is that Celtic will announce major cut-backs to their academy structure. The Treble Treble Winners will not be merging age groups and letting a sizeable percent of their young playing talent walk out the door for the last time.
Celtic’s Academy, like Motherwell’s on a smaller scale, is sustainable, is strategically important to the club and can as the recent transfer activity and speculation outlined above demonstrates, is an area of high and significant revenue for each club. For Celtic and indeed for Motherwell their Academy operations are crucial to the long term success of each club.
Imagine having to dramatically cut back due to, for arguments sake, short-term financial necessities. If that was happening at Celtic, or indeed Motherwell (where the fans themselves are the owners) then the supporters would be up in arms and the media would be all over the story like a rash.
Thankfully that’s not the case at Celtic or thanks to the David Turnbull deal, at Motherwell. Perhaps not every club is as fortunate.
Anyway, it could be a very interesting week.
