Celtic are all but set to sign Brighton defender and Republic of Ireland international Shane Duffy on loan, according to the Daily Mail.
Reliable Mail journalist Stephen McGowan has published an exclusive report that reveals the Hoops have managed to pip Premier League outfits West Ham United and West Brom to Duffy’s signature.
The Mail reports that despite the fact Brighton want a £2million fee as well as much of his wages paid for any loan deal, Celtic are set to come to an agreement and have the transfer completed by the middle of this week. This comes after further successful talks last night.
The Sunday Post stated yesterday that Brighton were also open to a £5m permanent sale of the defender in installments. However, that always looked unlikely, with four annual payments of £1.25m coming across as messy.
The arrival of Duffy would be Celtic’s fourth acquisition of the summer, following Vasilis Barkas, Albian Ajeti, and David Turnbull respectively.
Centre-back – check
You can always debate about how long this has taken the club and whether we should’ve moved sooner. Perhaps that is indeed the case, but in the end we’ll still be bagging a quality player in Duffy if he signs.
We’re talking about a player who has over 130 Championship appearances and just under 100 Premier League outings to his name. He’s also been capped by Ireland on 33 occasions, so he comes with a huge wealth of experience (Transfermarkt).
More importantly for Celtic, however, Duffy represents something we haven’t got – a hard-hitting, aggressive centre-back.
Christopher Jullien and Kris Ajer can do a job against most sides domestically, especially at Parkhead. Yet too often in the past have they been ruffled by physical battles away from home. This is where we need Duffy to thrive, and it’s an area where he should have no problem in showing in quality.
Hopefully, this doesn’t lead to any impending exit for Ajer either. The Express reported over the weekend that Ajer was the subject of some heavy Premier League interest.
But to lose the Norwegian is to miss the point. Duffy is effectively Simunovic’s replacement, all going well between now and the announcement. Letting Ajer, or any other centre-back to depart, is to weaken our numbers.
Once the Duffy deal gets officially finalised, our work at the back is done. We would finally have four or five options for two centre-back spots. Going back to the start of the summer – that’s all we were really asking for.
In other news, we discuss how Neil Lennon has found his key to success and how it’s time for him to stick with it.
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