Celtic faces threats on multiple fronts. Our leaders must get serious.

Tomorrow morning, I’ll be doing a piece on the latest Nicolas Kühn updates. For now, suffice it to say that I am both saddened and relieved.

Saddened that we didn’t get more money for him—although I strongly suspect that the £16.4 million fee comes with a lot of add-ons and likely a sell-on clause. Relieved because it’s absolutely clear now that he didn’t want to be at the club.

And when someone doesn’t want to be at Celtic, the revolving door can’t revolve fast enough to eject them into the street.

But as I said, I’ll get to that tomorrow.

At some point tomorrow I’ll also write about the Ibrox club and what they’re up to, because I find it fascinating to watch the spin coming out of there. Some of it is so preposterous it’s impossible to take seriously, but they are clearly making a strategic pivot—and it’s not a new transfer strategy at all.

Tomorrow I’ll talk about what they’re actually doing. For now, let’s just say they’re trying to make themselves harder to beat by upping the physicality factor.

That may work. It may not. But we’d better be geared up for a much more aggressive battle with them, and the fact Rodgers has mentioned tweaking the tactics suggests we are aware—at some level—of what’s coming.

Aware of it. But not necessarily concerned.

The change is in the air—and not just over there and not just at Celtic. It’s everywhere in Scottish football this summer.

Something about it feels… strange.

There’s talk today that Lawrence Shankland may sign a new deal with Hearts, which will be music to the ears of their fans—although I don’t know why, as he clearly chucked it last season and had one eye on the exit door only to find no one was all that interested. They’re under new management with Derek McInnes now, which automatically makes them a tougher proposition. But it also flies in the face of the data-driven analytics model they claim to be following.

Nevertheless, it’s a different Hearts side we’re going to face.

Aberdeen’s season was positively schizophrenic. In recent club history, I don’t think they’ve had such a mad rollercoaster of a campaign.

They started like an express train. Then we hammered them at Hampden, and they went off the rails. Their form fell off a cliff. But they rallied. They pulled themselves together. They seemed to have secured a European place… and then unravelled again, right before the cup final, on the back of another hammering from Celtic.

And so everybody thought—possibly including some of the Celtic players—that the cup final was a foregone conclusion. It was not.

I had plenty to say in the aftermath about the sheer cynicism and negativity of Aberdeen’s tactics. Their fans will argue the only thing that matters is whose name is on the trophy—and in some ways, they’re right.

That cup win guarantees them group stage European football. That means money in the bank, eight games minimum, and the ability to plan with real confidence. That’s a massive win for them. A morale boost. And in those group matches, they’ve got a realistic shot at picking up points, boosting the coefficient—both theirs and Scotland’s—and bringing in proper cash.

A good run in the Conference League would bring them more money than winning the SPFL. That’s both a damning indictment of our league and its governance, and a huge opportunity for Aberdeen to strengthen even further.

Hibs should likewise be buzzing. They’ve got a Europa League spot and a chance to reach the groups. It’ll be incredibly tough. I don’t expect them to make it. But like Aberdeen, a good Conference League run would do them a world of good—and they’ve got a better-than-average chance of making it there. I hope they do. It would be a financial shot in the arm and would only make them stronger.

Now the concern for both of these sides—Aberdeen and Hibs—is that their squads aren’t really built for this kind of dual-pressure campaign. They’re not used to juggling domestic commitments with Europe. Their players aren’t used to the schedule. It’s going to be exhausting, and whatever they’re doing in the league, the wheels could fall off the wagon spectacularly come winter.

But Aberdeen at least have the security of group stage football.

They can budget for it. They can spend more than they otherwise would. Hibs should see this as an opportunity too. So Scottish football is going to look very different this coming season.

In theory, all of these teams should be stronger. We should be stronger.

If we’re about to net £16.4 million from the sale of Nicolas Kühn, that money should go straight to Brendan Rodgers. He needs quality. He knows where. We all know where.

We should start by pulling the trigger on the boy from Royal Antwerp. We need a replacement for Kühn on that right-hand side. He ticks the boxes. We shouldn’t hesitate. Get the deal done.

Earlier I talked about Lennon Miller. The opportunity to go and get him—to slap £5 million on the table, which I don’t think Motherwell can refuse—arrives the minute the Kühn cheque clears. Hell, if that deal’s basically done, we don’t need the money in the account before acting. Start spending it now.

And that’s what we must do.

If the top teams in this league are going to be stronger, then we have to get stronger now. Tomorrow, I’ll write more on why the Ibrox club might not actually be stronger—but why they might still pose a bigger threat to the rest of the league.

But for now, we should act as if everyone around us is going to improve and come at us harder. This is a transformative summer.

All the so-called “big clubs” in Scotland have a chance to do something. To mount a stronger campaign. To challenge one another.

It might come down to how those teams perform against each other that determines whether one of them can make a serious play for third—or even second. It’ll take a lot. But it’s not impossible.

These clubs are in a better place than they’ve been in a while. What they do with the investment, the talent they can attract, and the money from Europe will determine what kind of campaigns they have—and that, in turn, could shape what kind of season we and the Ibrox club are going to have.

I want to see Aberdeen, Hearts and Hibs be better.

Because that forces us to be better. It forces us to push harder, work more, snap out of any lingering complacency. If the Cup Final taught us anything, it’s that complacency is the killer. And if we haven’t rid ourselves of it by now, the sight of these clubs getting on with their business should be the catalyst that finally does.