The Express and Star has reported that Premier League outfit Aston Villa have been forced to change their priority striker target this summer, but still haven’t contacted Celtic regarding Odsonne Edouard.
Villa have been the Premier League club most prominently linked with signing the Hoops superstar this summer. However, the Express and Star believes that they had their eyes set on signing Callum Wilson from Bournemouth.
But despite the fact he’s signed for Newcastle and left Dean Smith’s side looking elsewhere, the paper believes Villa haven’t come to Celtic with an offer for their in-form Frenchman.
A report in the Sun has stated that Villa have hit a brick wall in their attempts to sign the Hoops striker. The newspaper believes that Villa have switched their focus to securing Rhian Brewster from Liverpool after a fine pre-season.
Edouard has shined this week for the France under-21s, scoring in both of their games against Georgia and Azerbaijan respectively.
Celtic doing well to stand firm
The Daily Mail reported recently that Leicester are still interested in Edouard, but are unlikely to make a move unless Celtic lower their £40million valuation.
It stands to reason then that Aston Villa are in the same boat in that regard. With the Sun believing that it’ll cost them £20m to sign Brewster, that’s a lot less than what we would demand for our star-man.
And that should lead to a big thumbs up from all of us to Celtic for their firm stance so far. With two years remaining on Edouard’s contract, you can see the temptation in letting him leave this summer. It’s arguably the club’s last chance to get maximum value unless he signs an extension.
So it’s great to see the club not being bullied into lessening their value for the striker. We know what Edouard is worth, and it’s down to a cash-rich club to give us what we’re due for developing him into the player he is.
We’ll continue to wait for further developments on this one, but if Villa snap up Liverpool’s Brewster then it almost certainly rules them out of the running for Edouard.
In other news, a Dutch article has elaborated slightly on Mitchel Bakker’s comments about his future amid speculation linking him with Celtic.
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