As Ange Postecoglou continues to celebrate his Scottish Premiership title success this season, it won’t be long before he’s bringing in summer signings to Celtic Park once more.
Yes, that’s the nature of things at Parkhead. As historic and emotional as this year’s league championship win was, you’re not allowed to dwell on it too long. At least not if you’re the manager.
Attention swiftly turns to “what’s next?”. But that’s the kind of intensity and ferociousness that Ange absolutely loves being a part of. He’s consistently referred to this season as “stage one” [Daily Record]. Even if it feels as though we reached some sort of endpoint on Saturday, the truth is it’s just the beginning.
Winning the championship was really only the first step in Ange’s journey plan for this football club. Stage 2 will come next year and it’ll come via bolstering the squad and making it stronger in certain areas. Providing us with a level of cover that won’t see such a decrease in quality as we saw at certain times this season.
But in order for the manager to press ahead with stage 2, the truth is we need as many as 5 new signings to make their way to Celtic Park before the transfer window is up. The manager has already stated that he wants all arrivals in the door ideally before the players return for pre-season training at the end of next month [The Scotsman].
And that starts with the most pressing area of concern heading into the summer – the left-back position. Greg Taylor has arguably been one of the most improved players at Parkhead this season. But the truth is we need genuine competition and arguably an upgrade if we’re going to be operating in the UCL group stages next term.
Greg has proven more than capable on domestic duty. He can handle the rough and tumble of the Glasgow derby and Scottish football’s toughest away grounds. But there were times, such as Bodo/Glimt at home, that Europe proved just too much of a step-up for him. And given the lack of serious competition to his spot this season, that is the most glaring area in which we need to bolster.
Celtic need summer signings to strengthen squad options for next season
Secondly, the Hoops need another centre-back to ensure that we have a better level of quality should anything happen to Cameron Carter-Vickers and Carl Starfelt. We first need to sign up CCV and get him in permanently. But even after that, an extra body will be required.
It looks unlikely that Christopher Jullien will remain at Parkhead after the summer and evidently Ange doesn’t see him as making a major impact in his Celtic team. Stephen Welsh, meanwhile, still has some way to go before he can be a first-choice option at the highest level. When Ange says he wants better quality in certain positions, that will of course lead to some casualties currently in reserve. That’s just the nature of squad evolution.
Next up, a midfielder is another priority this summer. A defensive midfielder, to be precise. The boss has already stated another body in the engine room is on his radar [Daily Record]. In games against Rangers recently as well as on the continent, the Celtic defence was left far too exposed with not enough protection in front of it.
Yes, that can happen with the gung-ho style Ange is implementing at Celtic. But we haven’t truly replaced Scott Brown and the role he performed in breaking up the opposition play. There may be an argument to say that Yosuke Ideguchi could be the man for this, but we’ll still need another option in there. Especially considering it isn’t exactly Reo Hatate, David Turnbull, or Matt O’Riley’s game to play in that number 6 role.
Celtic could easily have won all of the remaining derby games in 2022 had they had a reliable number 6 on the pitch. It’s an option the manager could do with giving himself even if he doesn’t like starting games with one, but he needs a player in with the right attributes to carry out the job effectively.
Finally, a move for Jota is also a no-brainer. If he departs, we’ll need a left-wing alternative to compete with Daizen Maeda. However, having the Portuguese in the door permanently will see us have 2 solid options on either flank heading into next season.
Those are the 5 signings Celtic need to make in order to flourish in Ange Postecoglou’s second phase of the rebuild. It’ll be intriguing to see how similar or different Celtic’s transfer plan is to the above. So long as Ange is happy, of course, that’s all that really matters.
In other news, Carl Starfelt’s heart-warming Celtic tribute to Tom Rogic and Nir Bitton
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