Ajer on-board as strategy rolls forward

Norwegian football journos I speak to all praise Kristoffer Ajer (17) in the highest terms. The 6’5” midfielder became the youngest captain in Norwegian topflight history when he wore the armband of Start as a 16-year-old last April. He’s a strong and mature individual, apparently.

Despite having made only 36 career starts, Celtic have watched him repeatedly, on top of the loan period he spent at Lennoxtown last month, so they know the player they are getting. The information I hear of him is all positive, but he’ll be learning the game for years, and for the remainder of the year he’ll learn what it’s like to be a Celtic player, something he’ll have little inclination of at the moment.

I like this strategy of recruiting and deploying talent of this age, a policy which has been missing for around 40 years, and has contributed to a similar period of underachievement in producing prodigious talent. It feels right for us.

Welcome to Celtic, Kristoffer.