Unless Ange’s Mind Is Made Up, Celtic Should Let Scales Go To Aberdeen, But Only On Loan.

We don’t know what the manager sees and does not see behind the scenes at Celtic Park.

We can only make assumptions based on what he does in the public gaze, and the talk that Liam Scales is being linked with a move away does suggest that some within the club have made up their minds up that he will play no significant role next season.

But does that necessarily mean that Liam Scales has no future role to play? Unless something dramatic is wrong in what Ange sees from him, I think he’s a decent squad player who might well have a future at the club.

I understand that the manager will want someone better to challenge Greg Taylor – or supplant Taylor entirely – in the first team … Scales is not that, not yet, and perhaps not ever. He is potential, but that can be developed away from Celtic.

It is clear that the left-back position is problematic. It is clear that we cannot go into Champions League Group Stage games with the current state of affairs, and that may be unfair on Scales and Taylor but we’re in a brutal business and it’s a fact and we all know that it’s a fact, and the word from inside the club is that Ange is clear on it.

So it makes sense that there will be a signing.

It is clear that we will bring in at least one player in this position, and with Adam Montgomery set to return there that pushes Scales down the line. He is too talented to sit on the bench; that much is readily apparent. Aberdeen want him and he would walk into their team every week, so as a squad player for the SPFL he is more than good enough.

But we’re now looking to far tougher battlegrounds than Scotland, and we need a better standard of player if we’re to navigate those with any confidence. Scales has arrived at the club at a time when we have a manager who always wants to take that next step, and to a very real extent you could say that he’s being left behind by that.

Scales could still have a future at Celtic, which is why I’ll be very surprised if he’s allowed to leave on a permanent deal. If he is, then you have to say that Ange is acting with real ruthlessness and that’s something that will put every player at the club on notice.

It’s been a long time since we had a leader this driven and single-minded. Scales may well be a casualty of the manager’s ambition. If he is to survive at all, it will be with some time away.

He need not see that as a defeat, but as an opportunity.