The Daily Record has reported that Celtic could be in line for a major summer blow with Odsonne Edouard being earmarked for France’s under-23 Olympic team.
Edouard has just made history with France at under-21 level after becoming their highest ever goalscorer with an incredible 15 strikes in 10 games. And it appears that positive press has boosted his hopes of being involved at the Olympics, the Record states.
The delayed games in Tokyo will take place between July 23rd and August 8th, with those dates set to be right in the heart of Celtic’s Champions League qualifiers.
If the Olympics had taken place on the same dates last season, Edouard would’ve missed both the second qualifying round and the first leg of the third qualifying round.
UEFA have yet to officially announce the qualification dates for next year, with Celtic certain to be involved after Scotland were given two Champions League places for next season.
Here’s why this isn’t the blow it once was
Losing Edouard for European qualifiers is an absolute disaster at face value, but there’s more to this than what’s just on the cover.
For a start, not many will even be envisioning Edouard being here next summer. Given he’ll be in the final year of his contract and with no sign of it being extended, the Frenchman will almost certainly be off.
Whether that happens before the second/third qualifying rounds or not is of course up in the air, but Celtic won’t want him injured and risk losing out on much-welcomed cash next summer.
In addition to that, it’s not as if Edouard has proven to be our main weapon in qualifiers either. Last season, he only netted three in eight games. James Forrest was our main contributor with five, whilst Ryan Christie also bagged three. The season beforehand he bagged three in eight too. Leigh Griffiths, on much more limited game-time, bagged two last term.
The point being that Celtic have plenty of other weapons in their arsenal that are capable of gunning down European opposition at the qualifying level. With Albian Ajeti, Griffiths, and Patryk Klimala available, Neil Lennon should be putting their trust in those players anyway over a striker who’s into the last year of his contract and likely to depart in any case.
Celtic should easily be planning for Edouard not to be here at that point. If we aren’t, then it’s extremely premature on our part.
Edouard’s form at the moment for Celtic has been extremely poor with one goal in his last seven Premiership games. Whilst we’re all next to certain he’ll find his rhythm before next summer, having him involved in next year’s qualifiers looked optimistic in any case.
In other news, a senior club figure has disclosed the reasoning for Celtic’s controversial Sky rejection.
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