As his Celtic career reaches its final years, James Forrest looks set to become on the modern era’s rare one-club men.
He is the most decorated player in the history of the club with 26 trophies, and scored for an 18th consecutive season with his goal against Aberdeen in December.
At this point, it’s impossible to imagine the 34-year-old playing for any other club. However, it was a real possibility a decade ago.
Back in 2016, after an injury-ravaged period of his career, Forrest was seriously considering his options.
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Ronny Deila, Brendan Rodgers and a sliding doors moment in James Forrest’s Celtic career
Forrest was involved in a highly-publicised contract standoff with the club, six years on from making his debut.
Then-manager Ronny Deila said: “We offered him a contract and he has turned it down. He has told us he wishes to see what his other options are.”
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“I cannot see that we will go back to him with another improved deal because to my mind it was a very good offer that the club put to him.”
Sky Sports even said that Forrest was ‘set’ to leave his boyhood club after Deila’s comments. The Norwegian manager said that the winger had been “out for 550 days in the last four years” between 2010 and 2014.
Unusually, the contract expired at the end of the calendar year of 2016, putting the club in a position to seriously consider a sale with QPR and Norwich City among those reported by the BBC to be interested.
However, the arrival of Brendan Rodgers changed everything. Having made just a handful of starts in Deila’s last six months, Forrest scored in all of Celtic’s first three league games of their invincible 2016-17 season under the Irishman.
This left the parties with no choice but to agree an extension, with Forrest telling the Celtic website: “I had a chat with the manager in the off-season and as soon as we came back in pre-season, and he just said, ‘show me what you’ve got.’
“I made it clear that I wanted to stay here and I’m just glad it’s done now and I can focus on playing.
“I’ve been here since I’ve been nine. It’s all I know and it’s a massive club – one of the biggest in the world – so I’m just delighted to sign here again.
“I feel that I’ve got a bit of experience now and I just want to kick on and just play as many games as I can for this club.”
James Forrest’s incredible Celtic goal scoring record. Let us know in the comments below which is your favourite.
James Forrest’s later Celtic exit rumours
Within a few years, Forrest went from being linked with an exit through the back door to a big-money move to Russia.
Mega-rich Zenit St Petersburg were admirers of Forrest, widely being reported as preparing a £12 million move with a £72,000-per-week contract. He admitted to taking confidence from the rumours, but signed another new deal at Parkhead.
In 2019, he was playing the best football of his career, leading to sensational talk of interest from Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool.
In response, Rodgers said at the time: “I’ve no doubt, having worked in the Premier League, that he can play at that level. Absolutely 100 per cent. There would be no problems there.
“Some teams down there are playing one game a week where you can recover and rest. So James would thrive, no question.
“But I’ve never, ever seen one glimmer of him wanting to be outside of Celtic.”
We still haven’t!
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