Celtic Fans Are Tired Of The Matt O’Riley Rumour Noise. It Will Be A Relief When It’s Over.

Another week starts, and we have more speculation about the future of Matt O’Riley. This saga, in its own way, is even more tiresome than the ongoing speculation over Adam Idah. Every day, there seems to be a fresh twist.

This weekend, details emerged of interest from West Ham and Chelsea, the latter flush with cash from the sale of England international Conor Gallagher.

For all this interest, not one single bid has come close to the mark Celtic have set. It’s not that these clubs lack the money; they’ve spent plenty on other players and projects. The offers for O’Riley so far have been absolutely offensive.

We’re one domestic game in, but in light of how we looked in pre-season it is already clear that Brendan Rodgers has this team playing sparkling football, and O’Riley is a key part of the Celtic machine.

Did you notice something odd about his play yesterday?

It seemed to me that Rodgers had pushed O’Riley into a strange new position out wide, and O’Riley adapted well, and even drifted inside and got several shots on target. Here’s a statistic that sums up the strange nature of his role: O’Riley was our most potent crosser of the ball yesterday, with 11 crosses into the penalty box—more than any of our wingers or attacking fullbacks.

Rodgers is obviously looking at new roles for several of our players, and at the same time, Matt himself is refining his own approach and you can see how his game is improving all the time. The boss has said repeatedly that the players can keep on getting better, and Matt was the proof of that all the way through the last campaign, and you look at guys like Kuhn and it’s clear that the magic is working on others. Hatate, too, looks like a guy with a new lease of life.

Although O’Riley didn’t get into goal-scoring areas as much yesterday as he did last season – it was Hatate playing in that role – you can see from pre-season and yesterday’s game that he looked sharper than ever.

Chris Sutton has said, correctly, that aside from signing players to strengthen the squad, Celtic should prioritize keeping the squad together for another year. O’Riley and Hatate are forming a strong partnership, and with the addition of Bernardo, we’re probably only one midfielder short of having a really good balance there for going into Europe.

Without one of these key players, our job becomes much harder because replacing them is a daunting task and especially with so little time left on the clock.

This is the moment Brendan needs to get the first-team squad together and tell them, “You guys are my team for the duration of this campaign. It’s us against the world.”

We don’t even know how much of the speculation about Matt is true and how much is typical media nonsense. Reports south of the border are already denying the Chelsea story. So, there’s a lot of rumour and speculation, but none of the bids we’ve received measure up. Celtic won’t change their stance on O’Riley’s fee, nor should they, considering the fees players in England fetch, like the aforementioned Conor Gallagher.

There are only two ways this speculation ends: either Celtic firmly states O’Riley is staying, or he is sold by the end of this window. Until one of those happens, the speculation will drag on right up to the final day—just like with Adam Idah. Either Celtic or Norwich will have to make a clear announcement for the rumours to stop … or the business will get done.

We may not all be happy when the transfer window shuts.

The longer it drags on without progress, the more likely it is we’ll be unhappy.

But at least the closure of the transfer window brings an end to the speculation. It stops the endless daily checking for transfer stories and allows us to focus on following the team again. After a summer filled with tiresome rumours, with each day deepening the frustration, it will be a relief when it finally shuts, putting all this nonsense behind us.

At least until January.