Defo an experienced CB to partner Rogne or Chuck. I think there will be a few sold in the Summer ... I can see maybe: Ki (woudl have been Kayal if he was fit) - about £3m Hooper - about £4/5m Commons - about £1m So, replace these three with 2 experienced players - 1 more midfielder and a Striker (to go with the midfgielder coming in and a CB).
Pud, I am sorry I think you are starting your thinking from the wrong position. I presume you mean that you want to strengthen our side, if you do you don't start off by selling our better players. O/k Hooper has had a quiet spell, he is still top scorer in Scotland. Can you be sure that any striker we buy for say anything up to £10 m will do as well. Commons has had a terrible season with nagging injuries etc, but on last season's form and the last couple of games he has looked superb, I would really like to watch him a bit more before I would agree to sell him off. Ki is very valuable, has pace and is a good quick passer of the ball, has shown he has an excellent shot and can play from goal to goal, why sell him. Kayal whilst fit is one of the best players in Scotland. I think we are lucky to have all these players and I would be surprised even if we did play inflated prices we would be sure of getting better. Now we can sell Ras, Murphy and a few more not featuring regularly on the first team pitch but we need to be careful selling young players who have yet to reach their top potential.
Celtic are now a selling club and look to be doing it well. Get some players in for modest sums and sell on for a profit. Wanyama, Izaguirre, Kayal, Pooper, Ki; all players bought for less than their current value. The problem comes in selling them at the right time. Too early and you won't get top dollar, too late then form may dip £9 million for Alan Hutton?) or the end of the contract will see value drop (Kenny Miller). If Celtic want to improve the squad, then some players may have to be sold. With the way Rangers (and the rest of Scottish football for that matter) are then I will be surprised if Celtic's transfer activities will show a net spend over the summer. They don't need to spend big to dominate Scottish football, simply to keep doing what they're doing. Plus you'll get **** all for the donkeys like Murphy and Rasmussen.
I'd be looking for one more season out of those names. If we get in the CL then their value goes up again. I wouldn't say we are doing it well yet but certainly we have done well with phase one of the project. Allied to that is the young bhoys who have been dominant at all underage levels. You only need one gem to finance the entire underage structure.
Rebelbhoy, I just cannot believe when for the first time in decades Celtic have a good young squad and so called fans are jumping over themselves to predict and discuss the transfer of these good young players, Our current board has no great history of selling players. I am not so naive to believe that none of these players will never want to leave and will have to be sold. In the meantime I would expect the board to continue reviewing their contracts to enable these players to stay as long as possible. If we can integrate new young players from our underage teams then maybe we won't have many replacements to buy. In the meantime we can show our players how much we appreciate them by the noise we raise at games.
I agree, if we are selling it should be the fringe players moving on. Not always possible of course, but as SH says we might not get better players even paying big money.
Fringe players are not worth anything. Our business model is to turn a profit on the playing staff and reinvest.
If everyone is fit I can't see ki being a regular starter, so I'd sell. There are a few kids in the fringes ready to take his place on ye bench too IMO. I'd not be averse to selling hooper. Every penny needs to be re invested in a centre half, a striker and a decent playmaker. A permanent keeper needed too. So to get 4 players in we'll have to sell
Celtic's, wether anyone likes it or not, business model wil be to do what many european clubs do - buy young potential and sell on at a higher fee than paid out. Many clubs - like Ajax - make a success of it... Celtic cannot afford to knock back bids for any players! The 3 players named can be, in my opinion, sold without major disruption to the squad IF adequate replacements are made. My monetary estimates are conservative - maybe, if Mr Lawell works his magic, you'd get circa £6m for hooper, 4/5 for Ki and £3m (max for Commons) This strategy needs to be followed to ensure continued success.
The Chairman “virtuous trilogy of being able to keep our best players, build and develop significant value in our player pool and see improvements in football performance”.
Celtic can't afford to splash the cash without selling and this squad needs experience to make a success of europe (i.e champions league group stages). This squad was put togther on the back of selling McGeady (big bucks) and getting dead wood off the wage bill. 3 players with sell on value will probably have to eb sold and dead wood will either be sold on the cheap or released... Net spend will be £0 again - that why Celtic are a success (financially).
Exactly - keep the best players at key points i.e january but once their value hits a level they will be sold... No fan is happy at losing good players but to keep building cash needs generated. To do this, buy low/sell high!
Pistol Pete says we are 5 years down the line on this path. I think we are are at, or are approaching the end of phase one and we have to accept there ise going to be a turnaround.
I think some of our posters are under the impression that we are stronger than we really are, take a couple of our key players off this team and we all know the performance drops, then posters come on here saying how "pish" the team are playing. I understand the economics of buying bargain potential and selling at a profit, if we can, but we have just won the league, for the first time in four years, and posters are naming first team players they now believe we can do without. No offence to anyone but i find that a bit strange, especially when we are hoping to build a team to compete in European competitions, or have we given up on that and purely become a selling club?.
Lyon and Porto are probably the best contemporary examples of this method. it really isn't about shifting the family silver but realizing the asset at the right time and using that money to make the team better. The McGeady money bought in not just one replacement, but a few. James Forrest was one year away from being a starter and Commons months away from joining for peanuts.
Fair enough Rebel, I can understand this and i know we have done well so far picking up players cheap or free, i,e, Joe, Matthews, Commons etc. I do think though, that as teams, all over, are forced to tighten their belts, this option will become harder and harder to do, and bargains will become scarce for Celtic unless we can offer the chance of a decent run in Europe, something that has attracted players to us in the past. If we keep changing personnel i dont see how we can become a challenger in Europe. Unfortunately we do not have the same skill levels of the players from Lyon or Porto, and a lot of the players they pick up would not be tempted to play in Scotland. Im not looking to row with anyone but as i said i just find it baffling, that barely a couple of days after the league triumph, that there are posts about selling first team players as at the end of last season some Celtic supporters were suggesting Stokes should be the first one sold. That would have been a good move.
Yes and a lot of us would have shifted Sammy on in November. Myself included. I think we are probably only saying such things to move players on from areas where we think we can cope numbers wise and get a decent chunk to build elsewhere. The wage bill at Porto is not significantly more than ours believe it or not. If we have to go slightly higher, then our model could still work. i appreciate what you say about shopping in a diminishing market place but also we are right alongside a big market with big money.......getting a crack at us gives a good shop window to move to the best league in the world.
Porto have the benefit of easy Brazilian work permits as well as big cultural connections, like Celtic do with Irish players. Irish players are not Brazilians unfortunately.
