Bellamy Again

City’s chief executive, Garry Cook, was due to play golf with Celtic’s largest shareholder Dermot Desmond after landing in Ireland on Friday, 18 holes in which the subject of the disaffected 30-year-old striker is sure to have been discussed.
Lennon, though, plans to pursue the matter himself before returning to Glasgow in a bid to find out whether City are prepared to help bridge the vast gap between the wages Celtic can afford to pay the striker, believed to be around £20,000-a-week, and his current £90,000-a-week salary.

“There is interest, but it is dictated to by finances,” the 40 year-old confirmed. “I hope to catch up with [City] while they are here and see if we can take it from there.”
Lennon’s hopes of landing the player will be diminished by the fact that Bellamy, loaned out to Cardiff last season after the complete breakdown of his relationship with Roberto Mancini, would consider a rapprochement with the Italian in a bid to stay at the Etihad Stadium.

Despite the world’s richest club this week adding Sergio Agüero, their £35 million record signing, to their considerable attacking resources, Bellamy is thought to be prepared to hold talks with Mancini.

Lennon is also continuing to investigate the possibility of signing Long, the Reading striker who is also coveted by West Bromwich Albion and Everton, though the Celtic manager is aware that the £6 million price tag placed on the Irish international by the Championship side may prove prohibitive.
“He is a quality player,” said Lennon. “I have had him watched a couple of times and watched him myself. I am a huge admirer, but the question is whether he is in our transfer budget. I have not given up on it yet, but there has been no formal bid. I like the player, but whether our valuation meet Reading’s, I don’t know yet.”
More realistic would be a move for Derry City’s James Maclean, likely to be included for the Airtricity League XI who face City in the opening game of the Dublin Super Cup at the Aviva Stadium this afternoon.

Maclean has been the subject of a £350,000 bid from Wigan but Lennon has confirmed he is monitoring the player, acknowledging that “the Irish league has been good” to Celtic in recent years.

The club’s manager is also determined to continue his search for a goalkeeper, insisting he has not yet had chance to speak with representatives of Stipe Pletikosa, the Croatian international who figured in last week’s friendly defeat to Wolves, but confirming he would not be pursuing a move for the Belgian Stijn Stijnen. When asked if Alex Manninger, the Austrian, was a target, Lennon simply said: “I am aware of a lot of goalkeepers.”

Such matters will not distract the Ulsterman from a pre-season tournament he insists he is “delighted” to be taking part in, a pleasure no doubt heightened by the thought of Rangers dealing with the pressures of rectifying their poor start to the season as his side test themselves against top-class European opposition.

“It’s a fantastic opportunity for us and the players to gauge where we are in terms of teams of the calibre of Inter Milan,” he said.

“We made a good start in the league last weekend but there is still a little bit of rustiness in the squad which is understandable as they have only been back for three or four weeks. So these games are invaluable in terms of preparation.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/celtic/8671042/Celtic-remain-keen-on-Craig-Bellamy-but-wages-still-an-issue.html?

Personally I would snap him up whatever it costs. The guy's on a different level to every player in Scotland. Hopefully we can get it done.

 

Unfortunatly we cant afford to snap players up "whatever it costs". If we could i would have Shane Long before Bellamy. He did a great job for us in 2005 but that was 6 years ago. Now he seems a bit injury prone, sorry Tim but its a No from me, spend the available money on a good keeper. Surprised we didnt go for Pletikosa.

 

I will back Neil Lennon's judgement, he and Peter Lawell didn't do a bad job last year at the signing job.
Their judgement seems to be sound and both know that after the 25 men panels have been published their
could be a goalkeeper and a striker available at a more realistic valuation.
Before we become all snobbish, let us remember that we can't complete with them down south, so we have to
pick our way across the bits and pieces or else pull out a surprise from afar. I doubt if we get a goalkeeper from the
Hondoras or Mexico.

 

Great post superhoops

Great signing if we were to get him but like Given we wont be spending £3m+& £40k wages on a player the wrongside of 30.

With the 25 man squads in England and so man clubs vying for Europe their hopefully they would rather pass the unwanted players up here rather than one of their rivals. Imagine Bellamy going to Spurs and scoring 20 goals and giving Spurs 4th ahead of Man City!!

 

I know where you're coming from bonarmargy67, but it's worth it IMO. I'm ****ing sick of losing this league.

Bellamy would give us a far better chance of winning it. Leave it to the number crunchers to work out if it's viable. If so, we should get it done. There isn't a better player that's willing to come to us.