Our View: Celtic's Christopher Jullien is winning battle of summer signings

By John Reid

February 13, 2020

Celtic’s 5-0 win over Hearts on Wednesday night threw up an interesting statistic, as Hoops centre-back Christopher Jullien scored in the game.

At the same time, title rivals Rangers were losing 2-1 at Kilmarnock. A game which Rangers’ biggest signing of the summer, Ryan Kent, failed to score in.

Jullien, who is a defender by trade, now has seven goals for the season, which is one more than Kent who has six goals, who was brought to Ibrox as an attacker.

Celtic defender Christopher Jullien celebrates a trophy win / (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

That has to be a bit embarrassing for the Rangers man, to be outscored by a defender who plays for your biggest rivals.

Both players joined clubs for around the same fee

Interestingly, both players joined their respective clubs for around the same fee. The Scottish Sun reported that Jullien joined Celtic for £7 million, whilst Kent, as reported by Sky Sports joined Rangers for £7.5 million.

At the moment, it has to be said that Jullien is winning the battle of the high profile summer signings.

Kent may have scored a goal against Celtic in the Ibrox side’s 2-1 win at Celtic Park in December, but Jullien scored the winning goal in the Betfred Cup Final.

Christopher Jullien in action v Rangers / (Photo by Mark Runnacles/Getty Images)

Jullien is also part of a team that are striding clear at the top of the league, and have left Rangers in their wake with a series of comfortable victories.

Few would have predicted goal tallies

Few would have predicted that Jullien would have scored more goals at this time of the season than the player who was named Scotland’s young player of the year last season, but credit to the Hoops player, he has been in the right place at the right time in the penalty box.

That was shown in the aforementioned Betfred Cup Final, but also most notably in the 2-1 Europa League win over Lazio at Celtic Park, where the Frenchman nodded home an injury time winner.

Only time will tell which player ends up with most goals at the end of the season, but so far Jullien’s impact has been greater than Kent’s and long may that continue.