Not Actually that Crucial a Summer as of August 2023...beginning to now think everything isnt fine!

I don't see us signing another 5 players tbh, I think even 4 is a big stretch.

Most I can see come in is 3, which would boil down to GK, LB and LW, and even then I think we need to move on Bernabei before we go for another LB. I'd love to see us sign another midfielder but I think that'll be sorted in January.

As I said earlier, we heard about Nawrocki last Thursday and he was signed by Saturday by all accounts. Wouldn't shock me if that happens again.

 

We better have done so. Ange saw in person all the Japanese players he brought here, and assessing a player was one of his biggest positives with us. Rodgers has a poor track record in identifying players (particularly defenders), and now we have to rely on staff to do things right.

 

Makes for a good sound bite but didn't really match reality all the time, we'd made moves for CCV much earlier in the window and didn't happen til deadline day, and I think GG went as far as being shown around at Basel(?) before it broke down and came to us, if the player is quality and we think they can do a job for us there's no reason to walk away if it doesn't happen instantly.

 

Honestly think you could count on one hand how many assists JJ got. He was a good player though, close control linking play and getting up the park.

For the all out balls to the wall attacking we done though, his final ball left a lot to be desired.

 

Did we though? Once they got their extra 30% on top of the £7m or so we paid, they still got about £14m or about 50% of the sale price. There’s no way they were getting that without our help in Jota’s transition. We should be going back to the well.

If I had anything to do with Celtic recruitment, I’d be back talking to Benfica looking for the ‘next’ Jota. Doesn’t have to be a winger, could be a CM or a fullback or whatever, but the next Benfica player who isn’t going to make the first team, but with an environment of success that we can provide with attacking football, hopefully that could bring out the best for this ‘next’ Jota.

 

I'm confident we'll win the league. We still have a significantly better and more settled squad than Rangers, and have confidence that some of our signings will have a big impact.

However that shouldn't be the aim. The aim should be to succeed in Europe and take that next level. None of our signings give me confidence that we are aiming towards that. 1 or 2 ambitious signings would go a long way, with IMO us being around 4 signings (GK, LB, CM, and LW) away from having a really, really good squad.

 

Built and programmed by a 19th century terrorist sympathiser no doubt.

 

Dont tell the huns, it's not even a real computer, just a leprechaun in a box.

 

Irish Republican Amstrad

 

Benfica certainly didn’t get robbed for Jota they had a talented young player who had flopped on loan at a bottom half la Liga team. To end up with a good 8 figure fee out of that scenario isn’t a bad outcome. It is likely they made more out the Jota deal than what we did when you take what we paid into account.

We seem a bit loose at times with these big sell ons for players. We had one on the Edouard deal, apparently offered a ridiculous one when trying to buy Cho, I am sure it said Bernabei had one too all be it he flopped.

I know a 10% or so is the norm these days but 30%, especially if it’s on the full fee is excessive.

 

We just loaned left winger Tiago Gouveia to Cadiz. Apparently with a buy option of 10M€ for 70%.

We are really stacked right now and Tiago did not impress coach Roger Schmidt during the pre-season.

RW - Di Maria / David Neres / Andreas Schjelderup
OM - Rafa Silva / Gonçalo Guedes
LM - Aursnes / João Mário

Apart from Tiago, the other one would be striker Henrique Araújo. But he was loaned in the Portuguese league and I doubt we would loan him with a buy-option right now. So yea, Tiago Gouveia would be the most obvious name of "talented kid who has not enough space right now".

 

Can we have Di Maria mate?

 

I don't think 30% is excessive, I'm sure Frimpong had that and think Eddy did too.

 

I’d agree with that, Juranovic could defend well but was great in attack and with a delivery. Johnston improved going forward so much last season aswell

 

Hatate instantly became one of my favourite players about 20 minutes into his debut. Slightly different players but he reminds of me a little of Lubo in that I'd never heard of him before he game here, you could instantly see he was a player and he absolutely destroyed the Huns not long after arriving.

 

There was a good video on Tifo IRL recently about why a 50% hit rate is about as good as you're going to get if you do everything right.

 

See for Frimpong when you pay a few hundred thousand up to a million then a big sell on is understandable but when your forking out £9m for Edouard or over £6m for Jota when we have never sold anyone for more than £25m and only 3 players in our history at £20m or over its excessive.

Effectively we’ve paid out as much on a sell on as we did upfront for Jota if it is true it wasn’t just 30% on profit. Edouard was much the same we didn’t get that much more than our money back for him.

 

it might sound excessive but it's become the norm.

 

I’d be looking for us to foster this on the back of Jota btw, Benfica probably have the best youth development in the world over the last decade or so. Looking at Jota, relatively low fee for us, a high sell on, and it worked out for all parties.

Could be beneficial to both teams to try to emulate that success. Benfica have such a wealth of youth talent that will never be considered for your first team.

 

We normally have one or two loans. So two loans and 3 buys isn't that much of a stretch.

The question is do we need five more to come in. A striker is likely to be 4th choice. Midfield possibly needs one more but I'd like to see what Odin can do, and also Kwon.

So I'd be happy with a GK and a LB.