Chris Sutton has used his weekly Saturday column to explain where he feels the Celtic hierarchy went wrong in the summer transfer window.
The Hoops signed nine first-team players during the summer, yet not too many supporters felt completely satisfied when the window shut at the start of September.
Quality does appear to have arrived at the club, but perhaps much of it too late into the day. As a result, we may have given ourselves an even tougher ask on the unforgiving European stage.
Sutton clearly feels that way as he explained his issue wasn’t the business Celtic had done, but rather how long it took to happen.
In his Daily Record column, he wrote: “If you are going to think about achieving anything in the Champions League, you have to try and get those types in as soon as possible to get them working in a real rhythm before they enter the cauldron. We can all see that didn’t happen.
“The team against Feyenoord hadn’t played once as a unit and that’d be my frustration as a manager. You need time to get it flowing.
“Listen, you cannot legislate for injuries. You cannot predict losing your first-choice centre-back in Cameron Carter-Vickers, or Maik Nawrocki or Liel Abada.
“But there are some things you can anticipate. I said at the time Carl Starfelt should not have been sold. Not with Carter-Vickers just returning from surgery. It’s forced Gustaf Lagerbielke to be rushed into the fray without any experienced sidekick and we saw how that worked out in Rotterdam. Celtic knew at the beginning of May when they clinched the title that their group stage began in the middle of September.
“As soon as Jota headed to Saudi Arabia at the start of July, his replacement should have been in the door. If that guy was always going to be Luis Palma, he should have been signed way before the final week of the window. Palma hadn’t started a game before Holland. That’s not a recipe for success.”
Many of Sutton’s points are hard to disagree with. Celtic appear to have signed some players worth getting excited about. Hyunjun Yang, Odin Thiago Holm, Paulo Bernardo, Palma and more all seem like they’ll have something to offer.
But the worry with the latter two, probably viewed as our main attacking signings, is that they came in so late. Our Champions League campaign is now underway and neither are fully up to speed. We could and should have been in a much better situation.
Defensive-wise, it’s a little harder to be critical. We have suffered an incredible amount of injuries in that position in recent times. Both Nawrocki and Lagerbielke were signed pretty promptly, with the latter only really coming in because Starfelt was sold.
Sutton may have a point about the club moving the Swede on so easily. Sure, he wanted to leave but he was contracted after all. We just need to move on with who we have now.
Things should look a lot better once the new signings are up to speed and the likes of Nawrocki, Carter-Vickers and Abada are back from injury.
In other news, Greg Taylor’s role at Celtic hasn’t changed as much as you may think
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