Hatem Elhamed will finalise his Celtic exit today as the club gets set to cash in on him, the Scottish Sun reports.
Neil Lennon revealed after Celtic’s 2-1 win vs Motherwell on Saturday that Elhamed was to head back to Israel. The 2019 Celtic signing has failed to settle, with the manager claiming that he’s “struggled mentally” in Scotland [BBC].
And it appears that deal could finally be confirmed at some stage today. The Sun states that Celtic are set to bank a cool £800k for the Be’er Sheva man, who’ll return to his former club after agreeing a three-and-a-half-year deal.
As quoted by the outlet, Elhamed said: “Be’er Sheva was the most serious team of all, they wanted to sign me the most.”.
Hatem will leave Celtic having only made 30 appearances for the club [Transfermarkt]. Even so, he can hold his head up high after playing his part in an unprecedented quadruple treble success.
Hatem Elhamed has real talent, but Celtic exit was always inevitable
This is a move that has looked all but certain for some time. Given his family hasn’t been able to move to Scotland with him permanently, it was always going to be a struggle for Hatem to stay here.
The club has done the right thing morally. Even though we’re letting a talented player go, we have to take the human aspect of this into consideration. This deal alone is one that has most likely been done out of courtesy.
Because believe it or not, there’s a real player in Elhamed. He was a fans’ favourite during his first four months with the club before picking up a nasty hamstring injury. It was a blow that kept the right-back out of action for a further four months. Dealing with that on his own couldn’t have been easy.
You then have to factor in that Elhamed could hardly leave his house. He’s spoken before about how the pandemic has affected him [Scottish Sun]. Given he misses his wife and child, being isolated in his home for most of the day won’t have helped. Not when, in any other year, he could’ve been out bonding with team-mates and getting to know Glasgow more.
He was robbed of those opportunities, and it’s a shame. Especially when you consider the promise he showed at venues such as Ibrox or the Stadio Olimpico. Hatem made his mark here even if it was only brief.
He’ll leave the club with supporters’ best wishes. But there’ll always be a feeling of what could’ve been with this clearly talented defender.
In other news, a fresh Celtic departure rumour kicked off last night.
Receive a digest of our best Celtic content each week direct to your mailbox
