I heard earlier this transfer window that the club didn’t expect an offer for Moussa Dembele. There was interest a year ago, but a year of injury, then a fresh injury at the start of this season, convinced all that the player would be with us until January, at least.
When Real Madrid invoked a buy-out clause for Lyon striker Mariano on Wednesday, the French club were prepared to throw a lot of money around to buy a replacement, and their primary target was Moussa Dembele.
There are millions of euros at play here. Agent fees alone would be in seven figures, while the contract available for the player would dwarf anything Celtic pay. In addition, they were prepare to offer Celtic a lot of money. So what do you do?
Celtic were not planning to sell Moussa Dembele, just as they were not planning to sell Kieran Tierney in July. The club gave very clear messages to Lyon that they would not entertain a bid. Note Lyon president, Jean-Michel Aulas’ comments “I know the boss at Celtic well. He is basically like a bulldog who negotiates after yapping.”
The assumption in Lyon was that after Peter Lawwell’s “yapping” there would be some negotiation. Lyon expected Celtic to roll over, but Celtic did not bite.
The choice was to pocket the money without buying a direct replacement (as it was too late), or reject the offer. The sale was not even considered, by the manager or board. As we saw three weeks ago with Boyata, Celtic do not need the money, what they need is talented footballers.
It was right to reject the offer. Not just because we need players more than money, but because if we fold under player pressure, we will only encourage more ‘sore back/not the right frame of mind’ scenarios when contracted players are tapped up during a qualification campaign.
The football business is incredibly unstable. We contract players, who, if they succeed, will soon be able to earn millions of pounds per year more than we will ever pay them. You either sell when the big offers come, or turn your face to stone and sell when you are ready.
I don’t know if playing hardball this month will stop this happening again, but folding would guarantee tantrums every time a player receives an 80€/week offer. We could be sitting this morning with all the money in the world, but a little light up front. That’s not the plan and never has been.
The first piece of business today was the signing of central mid, Youssouf Mulumbu. Youssouf’s career came off the rails when he broke his metatarsal weeks after joining Norwich three years ago, but a cameo half season at Kilmarnock convinced Brendan Rodgers to move. Welcome to Celtic, Youssouf.
Let’s get Filip Benkovic signed up, and spank Newco back into their dystopian existence on Sunday. Oh, and Malmo and Sarpsborg would do nicely in the Europa.
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Sell Dembele ‘ AKA the moaning faced prick’ 2 years in to a 4 year contract and throws the toys oot the pram cause he doesn’t get what he wants. I actually empathised with Moussa and his wishing to move to France that is until I read his tweets — what a fecking brass neck he has. Get rid stick with Leigh and Eddy until Jan, can’t young Christie deputise as a forward?
JIMMY BONES
Where are you pulling this list from? And what’s you point or purpose? Some of the names are wrong, some are development squad players, and some need moved on.
… And some aren’t even in the right positions (Christie)
Maloney 5:51
If you’re not happy with my list, please tell me the mistakes & I will correct. I posted yesterday about this time, merely to point out the overall size of the squad I believe BR thinks it’s too many, not sure what PL thinks – what does the blog think ?
Oglach
So you know what, if anything, Celtic promised Moussa re transfer?
JJ
MALONE BHOY
Correct!!!!!!!
That was still Celtic wasn’t it?
Besides he goes down as Brendan Rodgers first signing, I think the record books will show.
Unless he was Lawwells fault?
I think Sinclair did enough last night to start on Sunday with JF on the right and OE, if he is fit, in the middle. Griff on for 20-25 mins if we need him.
Can’t see Brendan putting the new boys straight in, Mumbula is not match fit and Benkovic needs games too.
So likely to be the same as last night – Lustig, Ajer, Boyata and Tierney. Personally I’d play Gamboa as he links up well with JF and offers more going forward. Lustig’s passing is becoming more and more wayward.
Brown and Ntcham are certainties, but who is in beside them? Rogic? Calmac? Christie? Rogic is a hun skelper but carrying an injury so likely to be Calmac.
Actually looking forward to it now. Regardless of what else happens tonight.
Not sure De Vries is still at the club.
Hazard should really go out on loan (if not is not 1st team squad).
Same for Ralston if he’s not already on loan.
Commper is hopefully away.
Miller is out on loan.
Allan who knows what will happen.
Johnstone is just breaking into the 1st team squad.
Benyu is still a development player and could go on loan if not already.
*Arzani* is a loan.
As is Benkovic.
You could really knock 6-8 off that list.
Someone added Stan Petrov to a list of Van Dijk and Boyata’s (now include Moussa) who threw a girly hissy for not getting a transfer when they wanted. Stan wanted to leave Celtic but signed a new contract to ensure that Celtic received a decent amount of money in recompense for his leaving – FACT. Will Moussa or Boyata sign a new 3 year deal – emmmmm – no.
JIMMY BONES on 31ST AUGUST 2018 5:56 PM
I understood what you were emphasising; I don’t think t’s rocket salad.
You can remove Miller for the time being as he’s now on loan at Dundee but add Eboue Kouassi as he is still on the books.
Apart from that it looks about right to me; a bloated squad where De Vries, Hazard, Ralston, Compper, Allan, Kouassi, Benyu, Hayes and Christie will get little game time. That’s 9 that seem surplus with Morgan and Arzani (not Armani – he dresses the 3 Musketeers) still have to force their way into the team. So that’s 23 that I think BR will class as his first team squad (adding Morgan and Arzani if they impress).
KTF
Was ‘promise’ verbal and misunderstood in translation? But why did player and agent not have so-called ‘promise’ written in to the contract?
Hot Smoked on 31st August 2018 6:00 pm
Oglach
So you know what, if anything, Celtic promised Moussa re transfer
JJ
====
Did they? And if they did I don’t think that would have meant him leaving with 2 days of a transfer window left with no chance of finding a suitable replacement. And all his ass kissing since his original tweets about loving the club and support is BS. He knew that his leaving would leave us short but didn’t care a jot.
Why was Edouard not on the bench last night? Is he OK for Sunday?
My Team:
Bain
Lustig Boyata Ajer Tierney
Brown Ntcham
Forrest McGregor Sinclair
Griffiths.
I won`t be surprised if Brendan doesn`t listen to me.
Came across this on The Celtic Star page. Was completely unaware that Frankie Miller had penned a song about the Lions. Worth a listen:
https://thecelticstar.com/blue-nose-frankie-miller-loudest-roar/
Sell MD now – his attitude means weaker performance and will affect team morale – esp French friends. take the money Celtic!
HS
Bain?
if contracts were based on verbal promises , players wouldn’t need agents. A contract is a contract – anything outside of it is irrelevant.
Players mentality is a whole different matter.
We need committed players – we might also never get an offer of 22m again. Surely we can bring a loan striker and 2nd / 3rd choice at a decent league.
I wonder if this is ego related – BR v PL
Deniabhoy …
thanks for that …braw song
smiley a bit him and wee Jimmy had some awfy braw laughs together thing
Braw
DAVID,
KEV has a £49 fixation
Scott McKenna …
Aberdeen reject £7m from Aston Villa.
Think De Vries may be out-of-contract ?
David @ 6.16
Gullible is the most commonly used word not in the dictionary.
BOURNE,
The word Gullible is in the dictionary. It appears before hunch.
mullet and co 2 on 31st August 2018 6:22 pm
Scott McKenna
Aberdeen reject £7m from Aston Villa.
===
I know the world has lost all sense of reality. Here’s thinking that we bid £2.5mill more than he is worth when villa offer a mind boggling £7 mill for a guy who has a couple of meaningless caps and a handful of games in the SPFL. It’s madness I tell ye. I’d offer Villa Hendry, same profile as McKenna plus played for a big club and has euro experience and we will let you have him for £5 mill.
One other point is why do Villa’s scouts wait until Celtic have made a bid for a Scots players before showing interest. Just a thought.
Denia
Frankie is my favourite Glaswegian singer ever. My dad told me that Frankie Miller fae Brigton and Jinky were great mates. Frankie wore Jinky’s Celtic tap when he toured the USA and Europe.
The day the mighty Lions roared!
French media now reporting that Celtic could sell Dembele to Lyon tonight but keep him on loan until January.
I think we should make Moussa play in the reserves till he says he’s sorry, then sell him to Kev for £49.
de vries under contract till summer 2019
BSR
I feel Gordon is going through a dodgy stage. The way we play, I feel distribution is very important and Bain inspires more confidence in me.I do, however, expect Gordon to play.
I felt something similar with Broony at the very outset of the season but i did not know then he was carrying an injury.
JJ
go with a back 3 on Sunday
Benkovic Boyata Ajer
Malone Bhoy
There are other options ro explain why the club “allowed” MD to talk to Lyon if they were always going to refuse any offer.
– his contract may stipulate that when bids that reach a certain threshold come in, then he has to be allowed to talk with those clubs.
– his contract may stiuplate that if any Lique 1 club comes in for him that he must be notified & allowed to talk to them.
He may still go in this window, but more likely in January.
Either way, and regardless of his tweet to fans to the effect that he still oved them ete etc, he is clearly trying to force the club to do something that Brendan Rodgers believes is NOT in the best interests of the club.
Was he promised something that has now been reneged on? Who knows frankly, but we all accept that players of his calibre came to Celtic for many reasons, one of which would be to do a Wanyama or a a Virgil.
It’s very clear that when Stuart Armstrong signed a 2 year extension to his contract in 2017 (he was being headhunted by clubs in England) he secured an agreement that he would be allowed to leave at the end of the 17/18 season.
Celtic want to sign MD up to another contract and in the absence of genuine interest in him it was expected that he would sign.
Somewhere between the Boyata situation developing and 2 days ago, someone made contact with someone to provole this offer from Lyon.
Did MDs agent approach Lyon?
Did Lyon approach an intermediary/friend of a friend ref MD?
MD can bleat all he wants in social media about “real men” and “keeping to your word” but of this there can be no doubt – if his contract contained a clause that he could transfer to another club once a certain threshold had been crossed as he suggests AND that codition had been met – he would now be a Lyon player. His contract clearly doesn’t have that clause. The rest is just him manouvering for a transfer even if it left Celtic at a serious disadvantage. THAT is the reality, so his bleating about respect & love for the crest etc is PR fluff.
It matters not at this stage I suspect, but to use the old blunts’ terminology – this story still has some legs.
But the convergence of the Boyata fall out, the McGinn fall out, the ending of the transfer window, the apparent resurgence of Sevco, the public spat between a board proxy and BR AND the fixture of Sunday all put incredible pressure on our manager.
His priority is the game on Sunday & he was correct in suggesting to MD that he should stay indoors today.
To have sold Dembele at this late stage without an adequate replacement in place would have made nonsense of the stance the club made when they rejected the Fulham offer for Boyata.
It’s very clear that the same rationale was applied there. IE with no replacement in place the club couldn’t consider selling their most senior centre back.
IF we had signed a decent replacement by then – the offer may have been accepted. If Celtic had sold Boyata but had not signed another decent CB…..the howling would have been almost unanimous.
We know that the club tried to get DB to sign a new contract before he went to the World Cup. He wanted to concentrate on prepping for the World Cup and it was agreed tha eh would sit down with the club when the WC was over.
The players are looking after their own interests – both of them – no matter what stuff gets leaked to the press or in social media to present them in a positive light with fans.
I reiterate the question posed by others though –
Will the North Curve display a banner about Dembele and an ill fitting Celtic shirt?
I also saw confirmation bias mentioned on this thread.
We know that some will always look for a way to present events to confirm their own bias – I’m pretty certain I do it unknowingly.
It seems to me that it’s always a stretch though, to simply villify only those on your own hate list in every scenario, while excusing & vindicating every one else. “It’s never HIS fault, but it’s always HIS fault.”
What we need is for those in charge at the club to learn very quickly from this mess – how we got here and how to avoid it in future.
We can get behind the team for Sunday but still protest to the club that they’ve badly mismanaged things this summer.
Reminds me of the No True Scotsman fallacy…
For Sunday, keep 11 men on the field & take the chances we get.
Well, I, for one, hope Dembele stays and does a Boyatta, who, imo, has been the best player on the park in our last 2 games.
By the bye, STV really struck their colours to the mast in their evening news. They repeatedly showed the same pictures of Dembele at Lennoxtown this morning. Then, they grilled our manager over those tweets. Then, they moved over to Ibrox, where EVERYTING but EVERYTHING was wonderful. Here’s hoping we hammer them on Sunday.
Right guys wee change of subject..
The American football seasons starting soon and I usually like to follow the Green Bay Packers, however for some reason unknown to me I am getting a strong feeling for the
49’rs .
Any idea why ????
The word Gullible is in the dictionary.
It’s definition is as follows.
Celtic board sycophant, breath smells of pooh from eating too much PLC B/S, believes every word PL says is the truth, That the club will come out of each transfer window stronger, A brand new hotel (that the vast majority of Celtic fans could never hope to stay in) and some flashing disco lights will win 10 in a row
Revised again now V3 – thanks for the input. Source mainly http://www.celticfc.net/team, but I have removed Eboue Kouassi as I understood his contract has been terminated.
Goalkeepers (4) – Craig Gordon, Scott Bain, Doris de Vries, Conor Hazard.
Right back (3) – Mikael Lustig, Christian Gamboa, Tony Ralston.
Right Centre Back (2) – Dedryck Boyata, Jack Hendry, Filip Benkovic.
Left Centre Back (3) – Kristofer Ajer, Jozo Simunovic, Marvin Compper.
Left back (3) – Kieran Tierney, Emilio Izzagiurre.
Central midfield A (2) – Scott Brown, Yousuf Mulumbu.
Central midfield B (3) – Olivier Ntcham, Scott Allan, Nir Bitton.
Right wing (3) – James Forrest, Lewis Morgan, Ryan Christie.
Attacking midfield (3) – Callum McGregor, Tom Rogic, K Benyu.
Left wing (3) – Scott Sinclair, Johnny Hayes, Daniel Arzani.
Strikers (4) – Odsonne Eduoard, Leigh Griffiths, Moussa Dembele, Mikey Johnston.
Oglach,
Dae ye fink we wull huv the Hotel bult in time fur 10 in a row party, and are you going to it ☻
THE GLORIOUS BALANCE SHEET on 31ST AUGUST 2018 6:32 PM
That would be the answer. Been wondering about that for 2 days.
But it sounds like Lyon are streetfighters – making the offer public, changing the terms, coming out publicly with patronising insults about Celtic and Lawwell being a dog who yaps a lot but then lies down.
I would like to think that we’d told them to go foux themselves just for that.
I’d like to.
Moussa Dembele = Pierre van Hooijdonk