Celtic Should Pass On Bernardo But There’s a Case For Signing Adam Idah.

Every single transfer window, Celtic is forced to make choices and compromises. Even with £60 million in the bank and a chairman who knows that’s an untenable position, that is not going to change. We are still facing those sorts of decisions.

On top of that, there are now European football financial spending limits which limit what we can do, and so even if the will was there to spend every penny of that money, we’re still facing restrictions based on what we earn because of the wages to turnover requirements.

This puts us in one Hell of a spot, especially as our board over-bloated the squad in the summer window with too many players who were sub-par at best.

The dominos don’t stop falling on that one.

And so, whatever the outcome of this season, we go into the summer knowing that we will have to compromise yet again, because we don’t have the strategic mindset, because we let problems fester these last two windows and we didn’t fix some of the obvious things that were wrong. And it means that in the summer to come other things will get missed.

This is the inevitable consequence of having this board, so limited in its thinking. The manager will need to assess what the clear priorities are, and much of it will depend on whether we can shift some of the deadwood off our books.

One of the questions we have to answer involves our loanees. Do we try to sign one or both of them? We have an agreement in place to buy Bernardo for a set fee. We do not have a right to buy for Idah. Who knows what his club would want for him?

Nevertheless, it’s a question we should be asking. He’s impressive.

He fits the manager’s style of play, which is more important to the team than many people might want to admit. I think we need a real quality striker. Idah is not of the standard we need to reach the next level and act as proper competition for Kyogo. So, we need one of those.

But I think it’s important to note that Adah Idah has easily pushed Oh to third choice, and I’d be looking to replace one with the other in Rodgers shoes. Who knows what we would get for Oh? But investing it in Idah would be an upgrade to our backup option.

He would play too, plenty of games, and he would be a big hit with the fans, who already have more faith in him that they do in the big Korean who isn’t a bad player … just not what we require.

Having watched him now over a period of a few months, I don’t believe there is a case to be made for paying £6 million for Paolo Bernardo. That’s a lot of money and to spend that on a midfielder about whom very real doubts persist would be ridiculous. Hatate and O’Riley cost us less than half of that between them, and delivered from the first.

There are reports today which suggest that we might be willing to sign him at a negotiated fee. Being honest, that would have to be some discount because I wouldn’t sign him at all based on what we have seen from him so far.

He’s a squad player. We have too many of those already.

The old wisdom says “whenever there is doubt there is no doubt” and that’s absolutely true when it comes to buying players.

If we’re going to spend a sum like that, we need to be absolutely certain of what we’re getting, and the only thing we’re certain of is that he’s hasn’t done enough to justify that price tag. It’s a shame. With his pedigree we might have had a star.

But this, of course, is why you bring players in on loan with an option to buy in the first place. You can find out what you need to know without taking the risk that you’re getting someone who doesn’t hit the mark. He has looked good in certain games, but on other days not so much, and it’s that basic inconsistency which should lead us to pass on him.

There are better options out for that money. What’s more important is that there are almost certainly better options out there for less money, and with the right scouting team we should be able to find them. We need at least one central midfielder. Probably two.

At least one of them needs to be a ball-winning hard-man. If we’re going to spend £6 million on a player in that role then all good, but he can’t be some punt. We need to be sure.

These are tough decisions, and if you wanted a clear example of why you don’t give the head of recruitment job to someone based on his second name you could hardly get a clearer one. Ultimately, the man who will have to decide this is the boss himself, and it looks very much like he isn’t going anywhere in the summer, so the planning should have started already.

I would be amazed, absolutely amazed, if Paolo Bernardo featured in his thinking.

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