GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - MAY 04: Celtic's Arne Engels (R) and Rangers' Nicolas Raskin in action during a William Hill Premiership match between Rangers and Celtic at Ibrox Stadium, on May 04, 2025, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Alan Harvey/SNS Group via Getty Images)
When Celtic transfer stories appear, I always try to keep a realistic sense of what we’re talking about and what the media is actually saying.
I believe the stories about Arne Engels. The idea that there is interest in him from several different countries rings true to me. That sounds right.
But the idea that Spurs are interested in signing Benji Nygren as a replacement for Xavi Simons does not sound remotely likely at all.
I can believe the Engels stories because the pedigree is right. Arne will go for a big fee because the pedigree is right. I don’t know that Benji is at that level yet. The stories around him seem confected to me, and a little bit unrealistic.
I don’t know whether it is agent mischief or something else, but if I’m being honest, I’m not buying it. I hope Celtic are not waiting with bated breath for that kind of money for him, at least not at this stage. Not after one season in Scotland.
But I will tell you something about those stories.
Every one of them sounds much more likely than the idea that the Ibrox club’s defender Fernandez is wanted by the likes of Arsenal.
Arsenal. A club operating at the very top end of European football.
I very much doubt they are going to take any vast fortune they earn from success in the Premier League or the Champions League and spend it in the SPFL on a defender whose team finished third in Scotland.
I don’t know how any sane, rational person believes Arsenal think they would significantly upgrade themselves by spending £30 million on a guy from that squad. Their fans would rightly be furious at that and would doubt the sanity of everyone involved.
But the obvious holes in that story do not make the slightest bit of difference to the newspapers writing it, or to the Ibrox fans who seem determined to believe it. What is even crazier is that they are doing the same thing they always do.
By hyping this guy up like this, they are only making sure his agent comes in and asks for a bigger contract. They are only going to unsettle him when the so-called moves do not materialise over the summer and he keeps asking every day whether the phone has rung yet.
Has there been an offer? Has anyone actually called?
The same thing could happen with Nygren. That is why I don’t like those stories. That is why I generally detest transfer rumours like these.
But there is a difference.
We do not actively encourage those stories. Celtic do not brief the media about them.
The Ibrox club does.
It has been briefing the media about Fernandez for months in the hope that someone bites. Of course, he is not the only player they are hyping up.
Because we are back in the middle of another round of nonsense about Nico Raskin and the talk that he might be the subject of a massive eight-figure move in the summer, based on some phantom suggestion that he might be a World Cup star.
This is lamentable stuff. It really is.
It is dredging-the-gutter stuff. There is nothing remotely realistic about any of it, but that does not stop the media running it over and over again.
How many times have we heard that Raskin is on the brink of becoming this fantastic player? How many times have we heard that Raskin will be the guy who nets them a fortune?
Since the day we signed Arne Engels, when people were talking about his transfer fee, I have said the same thing. Arne Engels will go for a vastly larger sum of money than Nico Raskin will. I absolutely believe that.
It does not matter if Raskin is selected for a World Cup squad and Arne is not. Arne has already been the subject of a massive, confirmed transfer fee which came close to the Scottish record.
I have seen this pattern so many times that I could write the script in my sleep.
A Celtic player is linked with a move out of the club for an enormous fee. Automatically, the Ibrox club and its friendly media decide they can get a similar fee for one of their players in the same position. The fact that Engels and Raskin are both Belgian internationals only increases their conviction that Raskin will be the guy.
It is crazy. Anyone with the slightest clue what they are watching knows that Arne Engels is a vastly superior footballer to Nico Raskin.
But this is the start of it, and the American investors over there should know what is coming.
They are not going to be able to sell any member of that squad for major money, and they need to sell for major money if they are going to give the manager serious money to spend.
They will have to fund any rebuild with transfer income or dip into those alleged deep pockets of theirs again … that’s a slippery slope and they know it.
Their club gambled in the summer, although not to the extent some people think.
They brought in enough money that what they spent left them with a transfer trading deficit of around £4 million. They then spent another £10 million in January because they thought there was an opportunity to win the title.
That gamble failed. A lot of what happens at that club this summer will be about counting the cost of that failure. They know the only way to make that kind of money back is through a major sale. They have been working on the idea ever since.
It is just a shame, from their point of view, that as usual this is not merely an overvaluation. It is a gross and staggering overvaluation of the talent they have at their disposal.
No serious club is going to take those figures seriously. No serious club is going to pay those inflated fees. That does not mean the players won’t believe the hype. That does not mean agents won’t exploit it.
This is how it always goes.
The media inflates the price. The supporters believe the fantasy. The agents smell opportunity. The player starts wondering why the big move has not arrived.
Then reality hits. At Ibrox, in transfer business, it has the habit of smashing through the walls with a crowbar, and they never seem to learn this.
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I believe the Engels transfer rumours too and the possible fees involved, and I sincerely hope that they are true. If we get more than we paid for him, then that is a very real bonus for what has turned out to be a very ordinary player. The Nygren transfer talk, I am not too sure about, his goals and assist ratio suggests he should be in the same transfer ballpark as Matt O’Riley was, and if we get a similar bid then we should definitely take it. For me, despite his stats, there is still something missing from his game, a bit of dig, a bit of robustness, and he will always lack those qualities. He has truly been a blessing for us this season, but I would still let him go for the right money.
As for the huns valuations……who fks a give!
Scummy paper’s needin sold – Do Da, Do Da…
Scummy paper’s needin sold – Do Do, Do Da, Dae…
Do Da, Do Da, Dae – Do Da, Do Da, Dae…
Gullibears will buy them all – Do Da, Do Da, Dae !!!!!
If Spurs are watching Nygren then I can 100% guarantee it won’t be as a central midfielder, but as a No 10 behind the striker.
The Spurs scout, even if it was Stevie Wonder, will have reported back that Nygren is not. never has been and never will be, a central midfielder in a million years, in the SPL let alone the EPL. However, those same eyes will have seen by his touches in forward areas, leading to goals and assists, that he is a nailed on No 10, even in the EPL.
Celtic are do welded to the 4-3-3 formation that they have to try to shoehorn players like Engels into positions that they’ve never played in for their previous clubs or their country.
This has resulted in Engels losing his place in the Belgium team, so Nygren will welcome a move that keeps him in the Sweden team.
The interest in Engels will be real and I believe there’ll be a lot of interest in Nygren too. What we are guilty of is getting excited by the fee when we should know by now that the ambition is to turn a profit every window, not necessarily improve the squad. If Engels goes for £15m, £20m, £25m or more, it doesn’t make a big difference as to what will be reinvested. We’ll look to spend as little as possible. With Nygren it’s nearly all profit as we got him at a great price.
Now that’s a good business model if you can keep finding gems and, to be fair, we’ve done that quite effectively but Engels represented a break from that, he was a bit dearer (albeit we still turned a profit that window) and was a prospect with a good pedigree and reputation.
Year after year at Ibrox we see the press trying to kid on something similar happens there, Kent, Morelos, Kamara, Goldson, Butland, Raskin and now Fernandez were all supposed to be attracting big fees, only Bassey ever did, and that came on the back of him having a good European campaign when they got to a final, not a season like this.