Celtic has wasted years of Callum McGregor.

There is an argument for saying that we have already seen the best years of Callum McGregor, and that the smartest thing Celtic could now do is cut him loose.

I still do not believe that. I still think there is an elite-level footballer in Callum McGregor. I think the biggest problem is much simpler than people sometimes make it: he is playing in a position which does not suit him.

There are other roles in midfield which do not depend so heavily on having the legs to cover enormous areas of the pitch. There are positions built more around game intelligence, passing, goals, assists and the ability to control the tempo of a match.

Those are areas in which McGregor has always excelled. He has never been a hard-tackling ball-winner. So why have Celtic spent years pretending that he is?

I am actually gratified that more Celtic websites are finally starting to say what I have been saying for a long time. McGregor’s biggest problem is not that he has suddenly become a bad footballer. It is that he was never a natural defensive midfielder in the first place and was shoehorned into that role.

He has been playing there ever since.

But McGregor’s natural game is further forward. His natural game is around the edge of the penalty area, where he can combine with teammates, slide passes through, arrive in scoring positions and use the full range of his technical ability.

That version of McGregor was a fabulous footballer.

And I think it is frankly disgusting that Celtic have allowed this situation to continue for so long. Because McGregor is now becoming a convenient scapegoat for everything that has gone wrong this season and for problems which have existed in previous seasons too. At the same time, the club has wasted years of a top-class player who should have been operating at the peak of his powers in the position which suited him best.

Go back to Brendan Rodgers’ first spell, when Scott Brown occupied the deeper role and McGregor had greater licence to play further forward.

You were watching a footballer who could have graced almost any league in Europe.

He could control matches. He could score. He could create. He could dictate the rhythm of the game. He could arrive in dangerous areas rather than constantly worrying about what was happening behind him.

That was the player Celtic should have been building around.

One of the remarkable things about McGregor is his durability. He has played an extraordinary number of games. His fitness has always been exceptional, and I still believe he is capable of contributing at a very high level for another two or even three years.

But not like this. Not in the position where Celtic currently use him.

To move McGregor back into the role which suits him would require a major reorganisation of the midfield. The midfield needs reorganised anyway. It probably needs at least one, perhaps two, hard-tackling bastards in there. Celtic have too many nice footballers in midfield just now. Sometimes what you need are iron men.

McGregor’s current position certainly needs one.

Paulina and I have written and talked about this repeatedly because we have both watched enough of McGregor to see the sheer waste involved. It is one of the reasons I wondered whether he might even leave in the summer.

Everyone who watches Celtic regularly can see that McGregor is carrying more water than he ever should. He plays too many games. He carries too much responsibility.

But worse than that, he is being asked to perform a role which does not naturally suit him and then blamed when he cannot do everything that role demands.

That is not his fault. That is the fault of the people who keep selecting him there every single week. McGregor himself has been an exemplary servant to Celtic. I have never doubted his commitment, his professionalism or his willingness to take responsibility.

What I have doubted for years is whether Celtic are doing either him or the team any favours by playing him where they do. Whenever we have come up against top-class opposition, the weakness has been exposed.

McGregor is often not occupying the position you would expect your defensive midfielder to occupy because his natural instinct is to move forward and influence the game higher up the pitch. Of course it is. That is where he should be playing.

But every time he moves forward from the six position, he leaves space behind him where your defensive midfielder is supposed to be.

And I do not think McGregor has the natural defensive instincts for that role because he was never developed as that kind of player.

The older he gets, the more obvious the problem becomes. That position requires you to cover huge amounts of space. It requires quick recovery running. It requires defensive anticipation, physicality and the ability to shut down transitions before they develop.

Even if McGregor had possessed all those qualities naturally, which I do not believe he ever did, asking him to cover that ground alone at this stage of his career is ridiculous. If you played a double pivot and put somebody alongside him, perhaps it would be different.

Maybe then you would see another version of McGregor.

But without that protection, it is farcical to continue playing one of the best midfielders in Scotland in a position which does not suit him simply because the club has been too damn lazy to buy someone who actually specialises in that role.

And that is the part I cannot forgive. This was obvious last season. It was obvious the season before that. McGregor needed to be moved out of that position for his own good and for the good of the team.

Yet Celtic did nothing.

I increasingly suspect the number 6 problem will only finally be fixed after McGregor leaves. Then suddenly Celtic will get serious. Then we will go and buy an actual defensive midfielder.

Or perhaps we will take somebody like Mika Baur, or another midfielder whose natural game belongs elsewhere, and sling him into the same role for five years.

That would be very Celtic.

Meanwhile, we will have wasted all of the best years of McGregor’s career.

That is so stupid. So needless. And now so consequential.

Because so much of the way Celtic play still depends on McGregor even while he is operating in a role which does not get the best out of him.

Of all the short-sighted decisions Celtic have made with the squad over the last few years, this remains one of the most baffling.

It is such a glaring weakness. And the solution is so obvious.

You genuinely wonder which wannabe football manager somewhere above the coaching staff has decided that Celtic do not need to address it.

No wonder McGregor looks miserable just now. It is not only the results. It is not only the tactics. It is not only the style of football.

It is another year of running himself into the ground, covering spaces which should be somebody else’s responsibility and taking criticism for failing to be a type of midfielder he has never been.

Instead of being allowed to move higher up the pitch, take control of matches and make them come alive, he is spending his final peak years trying to plug holes.

That is one of the most sickening things about watching Celtic right now.

And I will never be okay with it.

Celtic had an outstanding footballer. They still might. But if we want to see the best of Callum McGregor again, the club has to stop asking him to be Scott Brown.

He never was. And he never should have had to be.

Choose The CelticBlog as a ‘Preferred Source’ on Google News for quick access to the news you value.