Celtic are reportedly fighting to keep midfielder Ryan Christie.
According to the Daily Express, Celtic are offering a new one-year contract extension to midfielder Ryan Christie in a bid to keep him at the club until 2020.
The Bhoys swooped to land Christie from Inverness Caledonian Thistle back in the summer of 2015, before the playmaker was sent back to Inverness on loan.
In his one full year at Celtic, Christie made just 13 appearances for the Bhoys, and was sent out on loan again, this time to Aberdeen both last January and last summer.
After almost 18 months with Aberdeen, Christie has hit 14 goals in 49 games for the Dons, impressing under Derek McInnes – and he may well want to keep Christie at Pittodrie for the long term.
However, it’s now claimed that Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers wants to keep Christie, and has offered the midfielder a one-year extension on his current deal, which would take him up to 2020.
The report states that teams in England are looking to land Christie, and rather than allow him to enter the final year of his deal, Celtic want to tie him down for another year.
Christie will now have a decision to make, as he has Scotland aspirations to factor in, having picked up one cap for his country, and first-team football is vital to his hopes of playing under Alex McLeish.
At 23, Christie is at an age where he needs to be playing regularly, and given that Rodgers has the likes of Tom Rogic, Olivier Ntcham, Callum McGregor and Stuart Armstrong at his disposal, Christie may actually be better off away from Celtic and featuring prominently elsewhere.
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