AC Milan still have a severe interest in Celtic star Kristoffer Ajer, according to Italian outlet Milan News 24.
The report states that technical director Paolo Maldini is still extremely interested in the player, and that he impressed with his showing in Celtic’s 3-1 Europa League defeat to Milan last month.
MilanNews24 does however believe that the Rossoneri are not willing to go crazy in their valuation of the Celtic star. They state that Milan’s hopes of €30million to spend in January will rely heavily on investors Elliott. Alternatively, Milan may need to sell Duarte or Musacchio in order to rake in their desired figure for the new year.
With Ajer now entering the final 18 months of his contract, unfortunately that would have an effect on his value. Whatever Celtic were looking for in the summer could now be tricky to obtain.
Milan failed to strengthen their centre-back ranks during the summer despite being under heavy pressure to do so. Manager Stefano Pioli even admitted that Ajer was one of their summer targets before the two clubs met last month (Scottish Sun). MilanNews24 believes the return match on matchday five of the Europa League could be a chance to resume negotiations.
Nobody leaves in January – that must be the message
In any other year, we could talk about potentially moving one or two on in January for the right price. However, with 10-in-a-row at stake, this is even more of a no-go than it was in the summer.
Celtic were firm over the close-season when it came to selling their stars. They were making it clear at every point that there would be no negotiation and that all of their big-hitters would remain in Glasgow. That’s going to be even more important in January when we’re just a few months away from knowing whether we’ll win the 10 or not.
Selling Ajer would have a massive effect on this team. The Norwegian brings so much both defensively and offensively that there is no true direct replacement currently in the squad. You can’t just throw a Nir Bitton or Hatem Elhamed in there and expect them to do what Ajer does.
Yes, come the summer he’ll only have 10 months remaining on his deal, and that will subsequently take a further hit on his valuation. But what would we rather? Take a few million of a hit on Ajer, or lose 10-in-a-row? Something we have worked nine years for to get to this point.
So if Milan want the Norwegian, the message from Celtic really has to be to wait until the summer. All the winter window should be used for is to strengthen the squad if necessary. Should any big stars go, it’ll open the board and manager up for big criticism.
Of course, what it also means is that the long, drawn-out saga we had over this in the summer is going to rear its head again in just under two months’ time. We’ll see how things go and whether Milan’s interest is genuine. But that shouldn’t change anything from Celtic’s perspective.
In other news, an international star who was itching to join Celtic in the summer has touched on how close he was.
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