Former Celtic star Lee Naylor has recently made a rather damning revelation about the club’s transfers and their approach in the market.
Naylor, who is now an agent, appeared as a guest on the latest episode of The Celtic Huddle podcast and the panel talked about numerous issues about the Hoops. They also talked about the club’s transfers.
Naylor revealed that during his work as an agent, he offered two players to the Hoops that would’ve fit into the club’s plans – but ex-recruitment chief Nick Hammond didn’t capitalise and Neil Lennon wasn’t in charge of the club’s transfers.
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The Hoops signed multiple players in the previous summer window. They spent a fee of £14.13m on incomings and earned a bit more than that from sales in the summer.
As it turned out, though, the Hoops have failed to win a single trophy this season and Hammond has since departed.
Naylor made certain revelations and said: “I put a few in at the beginning of the season to be fair, but there were no takers. There was a centre-midfielder and a striker. They were top. They would have fitted in well.”
Asked who rejected his approaches, he replied: “It was Nicky Hammond at the time. I don’t know if Lenny [Lennon] had much say, I’ll be honest. It depends how much a manager has got to say [if they are involved in transfer talks], if he’s ruling the roost. But I don’t think Lenny had much say, especially this season, and I think you could tell.”
TIF Thoughts on Celtic transfers…
Naylor’s revelations should be concerning for Celtic fans and it is perhaps a reflection of the idea that managers don’t have too much control over transfers at the club. Considering how Shane Duffy has already left, Vasilis Barkas has failed to establish himself as a regular and Albian Ajeti hasn’t been a regular either, perhaps Hammond did get the signings wrong.
But with the club now heading towards an overhaul, they should look to learn some lessons and change how they operate in the market. It would arguably make things easier for whoever their next manager turns out to be.
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