Celtic manager Neil Lennon has admitted that he was “very keen” on bringing Albian Ajeti to Glasgow last summer before his big-money switch to West Ham.
Ajeti rattled home 43 goals in 96 matches for Swiss outfit Basel (Transfermarkt), with 21 of them coming in the campaign before West Ham pipped Celtic to his signature.
The Hammers saw enough of Ajeti to splash out a substantial £8m on him (BBC). However, after an unprofitable year down south, Lennon has finally managed to bag his man who he claims won’t have lost his goalscoring ability.
As quoted by the Scotsman, Lennon said: “We were very keen on him last summer. We really liked the look of him. He went to West Ham for a lot of money and things didn’t work out for him, but I don’t think you lose the ability.
“You maybe lose a bit of confidence or self-belief but the talent is there. He just needs to get his head switched on to Celtic now and hit the ground running as best he can.
“Albian is a goalscorer. He’s smart, he has good presence at the top end of the pitch. He is similar to Gary Hooper, that sort of intelligent striker. He bumps defenders and can finish off both feet, he is good in the air too, he will get on the end of crosses for us. I think he will be a good signing for us.”
The kind of deals Celtic should keep an eye open for
It will be interesting to see whether this starts a trend of Celtic signings from the Premier League in the coming years.
When clubs in England’s top-flight want a player badly enough, Celtic have no chance in a bidding war. Yet you’ll do well to find many Celtic fans who believe that we shouldn’t be targeting players from continental Europe – a hotspot for Premier League clubs’ respective radars.
However, there are plenty of talented players who lose their way down south and just get discarded. Celtic are the kind of club that could seriously profit from picking up the scraps.
We did just that with Ajeti, snapping him up for a respectable fee of £5m (Sky Sports). The same goes for Mohamed Elyounoussi who we’ve now managed to get two loan spells out of.
Call them Premier League rejects if you will, but these are talented players with Champions League experience that England tends to hoover up.
Celtic’s reported interest in Shane Duffy is another example of us looking south for talent that isn’t getting the opportunity it deserves (Daily Record). You won’t many disagreeing with that transfer target.
Hopefully, this is a trend we see continue in future transfer windows.
In other news, Lewis Morgan has opened up on why he feels he didn’t make it at Celtic.
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