John Hartson delivers brutally honest Adam Idah verdict, months after Celtic paid big bucks for him

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Many got their wish when Celtic secured the permanent signing of Adam Idah in the summer.

The Republic of Ireland international initially joined Celtic on a six-month loan deal in January from Norwich City and he became a very popular player during that period. 

Idah scored the winner against Rangers in the Scottish Cup final, including many other important goals and there was a clamour to bring him in.

Hyeongyu Oh was Celtic’s back-up striker, at the time, but he didn’t bring that spark to proceedings and would then secure a transfer to Genk.

Therefore, it was even more understandable that the Bhoys would bring Idah in to, not just add quality to the bench, but also challenge the main man, Kyogo Furuhashi.

But fast forward to the present and doubts are beginning to creep in, even though it’s still early in the season and there are many more important games coming up.

John Hartson questions Adam Idah’s Celtic transfer

A Celtic fan rang up Go Radio and expressed that they don’t like Idah as a player or why the club brought him in this summer.

John Hartson was on hand to listen to the call and he didn’t disagree with that viewpoint and was pretty brutal in his own verdict.

Idah has been backed to play against Atalanta in the Champions League on Wednesday night, so he has plenty of chances to prove his critics wrong.

But for now, Hartson questioned who else Celtic could have brought in instead of Idah because ‘he hasn’t hit the ground running’.

It needs to be noted that he didn’t have a pre-season with the champions and has since played second fiddle to Kyogo, so that doesn’t help matters.

“I don’t know how many were on Celtic’s shopping list, I have to be honest with you,” said Hartson.

“But they went for Adam Idah. I think we all got, not sucked in, but we were all impressed last season. I think it was 19 appearances, a lot of them were off the bench, delighted that he scored the winning goal in the cup final against Rangers. He made a real big hero of himself. Big name for himself. Scored some big goals, by the way, in the run-in. 

“He hasn’t hit the ground running. One of them reasons is that it’s very hard to dislodge Kyogo. Sometimes when you feel that you are next man in and not the number one striker, it can give you that lack of confidence and you are thinking ‘the manager isn’t putting me in this week’, in terms of being the main number nine. I think sometimes that can halt your confidence. I am not going to criticise him too much, but I am not sure who else Celtic had their eye on last season. He cost £9 million. A lot of the fans might just say well. Could we have got a better one? One of the reasons why Celtic took him is because he did so well on loan. He seemed the obvious one.”

Adam Idah’s Celtic stats

Perhaps Idah needs that spark from somewhere, one game-changing performance, that big goal and then everything will change.

Celtic have a huge game against Atalanta coming up, so that would be an ideal platform for him to showcase his worth.

But, for now, he hasn’t really got going, with WhoScored rating his Champions League and Premiership performances so far as, 6.42 and 6.40, respectively.