If anyone at Celtic Park thought Kieran Tierney signing a new deal would shut up the rumour mongers and still some of these ridiculous stories about clubs wanting to sign him, well they were wrong. The nonsense continues, unabated.
Newsnow has a helpful function if you’ve signed up with them. It lets you “hide” websites from your Celtic feed. I use it to get rid of all the more egregious clickbait sites and I am glad to say that it works very well. Today that function has gone into overtime.
All the stories are the same; Manchester United set to “win the race” for Kieran Tierney. Were you aware there was a race on? I must have missed that, Celtic having received not one single concrete offer for the player. Nor would they want one or be willing to accept it if it came in. Kieran’s new six year deal tells you where the only two important parties in this saga stand; Celtic wants to keep him and Kieran wants to stay.
The other day I lamented Chris Sutton’s comment during the Bayern game, the one where he wondered what Kieran’s “release clause” was.
It was an idiotic remark but worse has followed elsewhere since. The general impression some in England appear to have is that the new deal is a measure intended to boost whatever transfer fee we eventually get.
It’s not. It’s a very clear “hands off” warning.
It doesn’t say “Available For …”
It is clearly intended to read something very different; “Not For Sale At Any Price.”
Part of this is English arrogance, the idea that they can wave chequebooks and that all heads turn in that direction. South of the border, they look at Scottish football with disdain and still believe they can poach any player from up here that they like.
Celtic does not need to sell and the majority of our players are in no hurry to leave.
The talk of Moussa going continues apace as well, something we wouldn’t halt by giving him a new deal but could at least quieten down some. The idea that he would go to Manchester United and sit on the bench behind Lukaku, Rashford and Martial in nonsense.
The idea that the club would spend £20 million or more on a reserve is, presumably, just as dumb.
But of course, the English media isn’t the real problem here; the real issue is the Scottish press and their unseemly haste to send the best of our players south of the border instead of keeping them here and helping to grow our domestic game.
It’s understandable, of course, because those players are part of the Invincible squad they cannot wait to see broken up, but it still stinks. It still sticks in your throat when you have to plough through endless articles about it.
Today the kid himself has said that he always focuses on our club rather than the nonsense in the media; that speaks volumes for the maturity of Kieran, and the values he holds dear.
“I’ve always had aspirations to play for Celtic, and that’s what I’m doing,” he said. “I’m very happy here, that’s why I’ve signed a long-term deal. I know I’m still young and have a lot of learning to do but I’m under the right manager to do that. People are giving me compliments but I don’t like talking about my game to much. I just want to train hard and play on the Saturday. Hopefully, I play well and where that takes me it will take me.”
I think we’ve got a future captain here.