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Rumours, Done Deals, Dead Deals And Endless Nonsense: All The Celtic Transfer Stories As Things Stand.

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TWO WASTED WEEKS AND AN UNHAPPY ENDING.

As James already pointed out in his article earlier, the David Turnbull saga is the sad story of this transfer window, one without a happy ending for anyone involved. It provided no end of drama over the course of its two week running time.

First, we made a bid and that bid was rejected. At that point there was a danger that this would turn into another John McGinn type situation, with the clubs unable to agree a fee until someone from England stepped in and pulled the rug out from under us.

But, in the first major shock of this window, Celtic turned up the heat and made Motherwell a barn-storming offer which they club accepted at once. Indeed, in their excitement to accept it they tweeted it to the world, which in hindsight was probably a mistake.

Celtic brought the player to Celtic Park for talks, as everyone knows, and as everyone knows those talks failed.

Celtic issued a very public rebuke to the player and his agent, and said it was a “take it or leave it” type deal. At that point, we all thought it was dead.

In fact, James argued that it should be.

Then we got another twist; the move was back on and Celtic were in talks with his agent to see if there was room to manoeuvre.

Something had changed in the dynamic, but what was it?

Whatever it was, the player and his agent seemed happy to get back around the table and Celtic was up for it. It was a surprise, but we were happy to take it.

Then suddenly it was off again, and it was off the whole way.

Celtic withdrew the contract offer and the bid.

They were “moving on to other targets”. That was that.

On the night Celtic pulled out, Norwich stepped in and they bid what we had, their offer was accepted, the player went down to meet with them and there was not a single person who thought we had a chance.

But all of a sudden, everything changed.

He went to Norwich, heard them out, knew there was more money on the table … and he picked Celtic anyway.

Not only was the deal back on, but the player had turned the situation completely around.

He was even allowed to be photographed for a CelticTV interview in a Celtic top … talk about jinxing yourself.

Days went by without a word, and suddenly the deal was in doubt all over again.

This time there was to be no dramatic ending which upended the situation.

Celtic’s meticulous medical had found a serious underlying issue.

The boy needs surgery.

We wanted to take him off Motherwell’s hands for the duration, give him the best treatment we could and see if he was fit to play … and in that scenario we were going to pay them the full fee.

They said no. He stays where he is.

The deal looks dead again … although January may offer us another shot at it.

As James said, it’s the player you have to feel for although this cost us two weeks we could have spent chasing down alternatives.

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