Reo Hatate shut down the intense online speculation surrounding his absence from the celebrations at Celtic Park on Sunday afternoon after the team had won the league at Tynecastle with a 2-0 win over Hearts making it mathematically impossible for theRangers to catch Ange Postecoglou’s side as Celtic won an 11th title in 12 seasons.
Hatate was yesterday announced as one of three Celtic players on the four man shortlist for the PFA Scotland Player of the Year. The midfielder is joined by his fellow countryman Kyogo and club captain Callum McGregor with Motherwell striker Kevin Van Veen.
The media have linked Hatate with a summer move to Brighton, and as the rumour grew arms and legs there were unconfirmed reports of someone seeing the Japanese midfielder at Glasgow Airport while the celebrations were on-going outside Celtic Park. And this was embellished by the likely destination as Hatate was apparently heading south to watch his friend Kaoru Mitoma play against Everton on Monday evening, where Brighton got pumped. In fact Reo watched that match at home in Glasgow on television.
Reo not only shut down the gossip but like Liel Abada and Kyogo, confirmed that he is happy at Celtic and plans to stay around as he talked up his target of achieving Champions League success at the club next season.
“Well, you can leave me alone, maybe? It’s not a big deal,” Hatate said, as reported by The Herald, when asked about the internet rumours from Sunday evening. “People are reading too much into it. I had my personal things so I had to be away from the team. But that’s all, nothing else.
“I wasn’t at the Brighton game – I watched it on the television in my house.
“The main thing is that I play for Celtic. This is where I am, and I am focusing on the rest of the games.”
Hatate said he was honoured to be nominated by his fellow professionals and while Celtic already have two trophies in the cabinet at Paradise with perhaps the Scottish Cup to follow, for Hatate the ultimate target is the Champions League.
“That would be a great thing for my career to try to impress the other teams,” Hatate said. “But then at the same time they are tough games in the Champions League so I don’t think I can play (well) in every game. There will be good and bad of course. All I can do is prepare and try and do my best.
“After the six games in the Champions League group, personally I think the other teams had better qualities in terms of technique and they finish when they get chances to score. But at the same time we kept the ball well.
“That we think we can do at the same level so if we can improve our technique and if we can finish better than this season then I think we can compete next season.”
So that’s three top Celtic stars who could possibly have been targeted for summer moves given their success at the club and the speculation surrounding them as potential big money exits, all confirming that they are perfectly happy to remain at Celtic. Long may it continue.
Latest batch of orders for “Glory to their name” posted earlier today. Very fitting that the 130th anniversary of @CelticFC’s first-ever League title win should fall in the week we claimed our latest. The more things change…
Signed copies available at https://t.co/amaUidjFbG pic.twitter.com/HIr82R27yn
— Matt Corr (@Boola_vogue) May 10, 2023
READ THIS…Celtic v Glasgow City: Team News, Match Officials, KO time and Where to Watch
