Arsenal’s Treatment Of Tierney Increases The Chances Of His Ending Up At Celtic Park.

Look, for the record, I have been dead-set against a return to this club for Kieran Tierney. It would cost us a fortune even if he was only coming here on loan. But little by little I’ve come to the conclusion that a deal for him is more likely than not. Arsenal’s treatment of him, which is way beyond what’s rational on their part, makes it so.

What exactly is their plan for Tierney? They are demanding an unfathomably high transfer fee in order to let him go. But at the same time, they have removed him from their first team squad and placed him in the reserves. It hardly screams for other clubs to come in and offer big money for him. I thought one would have by now, but perhaps this explains it.

There is another explanation, and one gaining credence; maybe Tierney only want to come home. I find that slightly hard to believe, because if, say, Newcastle wanted him and were prepared to pay the big money I think he’d go. What he wants to do is play, and if clubs in England won’t offer him that chance then he’ll go somewhere where the manager will.

Kieran Tierney would walk into this team. That’s just a plain and simple unarguable unalterable fact. I would be worried if we paid a lot of money for him, because he does some have injury issues and they would concern me. But I was shocked – and I mean that genuinely – to be reminded that Kieran is only 26; if we did sign him we could probably count on him staying at the club for the next three or four years minimum. Which solves a lot of problems.

But a permanent deal is unlikely if we’re being generous. I always thought a loan deal would be the more obvious bet, and especially with him being able to play right back very well and in central defence; he’s excelled for Steve Clarke’s team in both of those positions, against some proper good opposition. I have little doubt he could tick a lot of boxes.

My old man thinks Arteta’s issue with Tierney is an Ibrox thing; I would tend to disagree because Arteta is just another guy who played there. More likely, Tierney, who is not a guy who will keep his mouth shut if he thinks he’s been messed about, has expressed dissatisfaction with the way he’s been treated generally and Arteta is now acting out of pique. But you never know, because Ibrox does weird things to people and you can’t rule it out.

But Arteta certainly isn’t giving Tierney a fair shake, and so there’s a big problem between them, and it is one which it seems to me is unlikely to be fixed. Tierney has no future at Arsenal, and that’s about as obvious as anything can be, and so he will move on and probably not for anywhere near the kind of money they want for him.

I thought this was one that would go to the wire. I thought this was one that might end with us making a move on the transfer window’s final day. I think obviously we may have to move sooner than that now, with the current injury issues we have.

A deal now is much more likely than it was. There would have to be compromises on all sides, but since he and the club have pretty much burned their bridges its in no-ones interests for the situation with him to simply rumble on and on and on.

We can give the club and the player a solution … and in the short term at least, come up with something that might work for us as well.