Celtic are interested in signing Rapid Vienna midfielder Dejan Ljubicic, according to a Daily Mail report this weekend.
The paper says that the Austrian top-flight side are willing to sell him for as little as £2m this summer and that the Scottish champions are one of the teams in the hunt for his signature.
Brentford, Southampton and Rangers are all also credited with an interest alongside clubs from Germany and Russia.
The 22-year-old has previous form against Steven Gerrard’s side.
It was his late goal in December 2018 that knocked the Ibrox side out of the Europa League group stage and sent Rapid through to face Inter in the knockout stages.
He’s not known for his goalscoring or attacking play though and has been primarily utilised in a defensive midfield role throughout his early career, making almost 100 appearances for his current side.
Having made 12 appearances for the Austrian U21 side up to June last year, he’ll be knocking on the door of his national team if he continues his current progress.
Ljubicic is not the first defensive midfielder linked with the club this summer, with the Hoops also said to be keen on Ligue 1 regular Haris Belkebla, who plays for Brest.
It seems this is an area of the squad that Neil Lennon could be looking to strengthen ahead of the new campaign despite having a multitude of options in Scott Brown, Callum McGregor, Olivier Ntcham and Ismaila Soro.
Is the manager planning an overhaul in the middle of the park?
It’ll be interesting to see if this reported interest in Ljubicic firms up over the coming weeks.
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