Premier League giants Spurs were reportedly hoping to raid Scottish Premiership champions Celtic for young Norwegian centre-back Kristoffer Ajer.
There is no doubting Kristoffer Ajer’s talent and potential. His experience at the highest level, however, could do with some work.
The 20-year-old broke into Celtic’s first-team plans at the start of last season after an impressive spell on loan at Kilmarnock and has never looked back. He made 24 Scottish Premiership appearances last season as The Hoops sealed a seventh successive domestic title.
Blessed with excellent technical ability and superb reading of the game, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that Ajer can also play in midfield – or, for that matter, why he has attracted the attention of clubs from south of the border.
TEAMtalk reported back in March that Tottenham Hotspur had been keeping a close eye on the young Norwegian. Mauricio Pochettino is a man renowned for moulding young talents and Ajer is definitely the sort of player that could thrive under his leadership.
But the youngster has a long way to go yet. An excellent performance in the 1-1 first-leg draw with AEK Athens in Celtic’s doomed Champions League qualifier was marred by a mistake leading up to the visitor’s away goal, where Ajer was caught badly out of position.
The same thing happened in the score-draw away at Lithuanian champions Suduva in Thursday’s Europa League play-off.
This is the kind of naïve mistake normally associated with young defenders. But if Ajer wants to go all the way to the top with a team like Tottenham, he needs to eradicate this as quickly as possible.
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