Has Peter Lawwell lived up to his word this summer?

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Peter Lawwell may feel he has lived up to his word in terms of transfers this summer.

Every single window, the Celtic chief executive relays the message about the club wanting to improve the team with some adequate signings. The exact quote (taken from last February) is: “We want to come out every transfer window stronger than we’ve gone in.”

So, quite simply, have Lawwell and the Celtic recruitment team lived up to their word this time around? Let’s take a look at where Celtic were and are now in some key areas.

Left-back

Perhaps the most talked about area over the summer was at left-back. It all hinged around Kieran Tierney really. The defender was subject to numerous failed bids from Arsenal before they finally met our £25million asking price and completed the signing.

Celtic fans came to terms with his departure relatively quickly. It had been coming after all. They soon turned attentions to who would replace him.

The summer departure of Emilio Izaguirre meant that we were likely to need two full-backs. Boli Bolingoli-Mbombo joined at the start of the window and Greg Taylor right at the end.

Verdict: Losing Tierney was always going to weaken us, but the fact we now have two first-team left-backs who can fight it out can only be a positive. Given that we’ve also made a £19million odd profit in the position, it has to be deemed a success.

Centre-back

Celtic knew that Dedryck Boyata and Filip Benkovic wouldn’t be at the club from pretty early on. That meant that is was pretty important to make Christopher Jullien our first summer signing.

The jury is still out on the Frenchman but he did look imperious in the recent victory over Rangers. On that form he could be every bit as good, if not better, than Boyata. The worry is that we don’t have the same strength in depth as last season.

That has already been highlighted by Nir Bitton playing there.

Verdict: All will depend on how good Jullien can be for us. On the face of it we do look a little weaker at centre-back, although the development of Kristoffer Ajer could battle against that.

Right-back

The final area of discussion is, unsurprisingly, another defensive one. Celtic lost a number of right-backs in the summer including Jeremy Toljan, Cristian Gamboa and (most notably) Mikael Lustig.

The latter seems to have been replaced by Hatem Abd Elhamed. The Israel international looks a better option than the Swede from early viewings. Added to that, Moritz Bauer and youngster Jeremie Frimpong have come in, giving us the depth we lacked before.

Verdict: Stronger. It would have been hard for the recruitment team not to improve our right-back options. However, they do seem to have bought astutely with Elhamed while there are high hopes for both Bauer and Frimpong too.