Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers has only started Scott Sinclair in one Scottish Premiership game this season.
Cast your mind back to the 2016/17 season and there was no one in Scotland’s top flight who could come near to Scott Sinclair.
The winger enjoyed a tremendous debut season north of the border after his £3 million move from Aston Villa, scoring a career-best 25 goals in all competitions and winning the SPFA Player of the Year award to boot.
Few would have expected then that Sinclair would be warming the bench just over a year later. The 29-year-old’s form stalled midway through last season and there appears to be no end in sight to his sudden and alarming decline.
Shockingly, Sinclair has started just one league game all season, the 1-0 defeat to Hearts, and was only introduced as a stoppage time substitute in the recent Old Firm victory against Rangers. And perhaps the most alarming sign so far came in Paisley on Friday. Celtic stuttered to a goalless draw away at St Mirren but Rodgers decided against even bringing Sinclair off the bench.
His favoured role on the left-hand side has been taken by Callum McGregor, the central midfielder who has thrived in a wider position and made himself almost indispensable to Brendan Rodgers.
Now, Sinclair also has to contend with two new signings, Australian wonderkid Daniel Arzani and former St Mirren talisman Lewis Morgan, who scored 18 times as The Buddies stormed to the Championship title last season.
Neither Arzani nor Morgan have made their league debut yet for Celtic but were spotted training with the first-team last week and they are guaranteed to get their chance in the coming months.
Suddenly, Sinclair’s future at Celtic looks uncertain. And he only has himself to blame for letting the standards slip.
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