OPINION
Brendan Rodgers must continue with Celtic’s plan to wave goodbye to Cristian Gamboa in the summer as the defender is clearly not good enough for the club.
The Scottish Sun reported on Sunday that the 28-year-old right-back was set to leave Parkhead in the summer after being pictured on holiday during the build-up to last Sunday’s clash against Rangers.
The newspaper went onto state that Costa Rica manager Oscar Ramirez was set to meet with Rodgers on Thursday at Celtic’s training complex in order to convince the Hoops manager to give the defender more playing time.
Gamboa is an important member of Costa Rica’s World Cup-bound squad and his international manager knows the right-back needs to be featuring regularly in order to be at his best in the summer.
The 28-year-old has made only three appearances for the Hoops this season, with his last outing being against St Johnstone in October.
Gamboa endured a torrid time against Bayern Munich in one of his three outings during this campaign, and his performance against the German giants appears to have sealed his fate.
The right-back was all over the shop during the 3-0 defeat to Jupp Heynckes’ side, which appeared to make it clear to Rodgers that the defender needed to exit the club.
The Hoops manager’s decision to hardly play the defender since that defeat was the correct choice as Gamboa has never looked capable of being a success at Parkhead in any of the 24 appearances he has made for the club.
The 28-year-old’s Hoops contract is set to expire in 2019, so the summer window will potentially be the Bhoys’ last chance to get rid of him and get a fee in return.
Therefore Rodgers’ should ignore Ramirez’s plea to play Gamboa more and proceed with plans to get rid of him in the summer.