Whoever said you can’t build a new squad overnight?
When the number of new Celtic transfers reached double figures in the summer of 2021, the arrivals of Liel Abada, Kyogo Furuhashi, Carl Starfelt and Filipe Jota were accompanied by plenty of doom-laden prediction. With so many new faces arriving, the cynics said, it would take a season or two at least for Ange Postecoglou to transform this motley crew of unknown quantities into a team worthy of the word.
Some ten months on, Celtic are, for all intents and purposes, just one win away from snatching their crown back from the clutches of Old Firm rivals Rangers.
But recruitment has not always been Celtic’s strong point, as you’re about to find out…
Celtic transfers you want to forget
Teemu Pukki
The fleet-footed Finn may be one of the most prolific centre-forwards plying his trade south of the border – Pukki has 77 goals in 163 games since joining Norwich City from Brondby in 2018 – but few would have seen this coming when the striker was struggling to adapt to the pace and power of life in the Glasgow goldfish bowl.
“I signed Teemu,” former Hoops boss Neil Lennon told the BBC, recalling Pukki’s ill-fated £3 million move nearly a decade ago.
“But it was just maybe too soon for him in that environment, and it didn’t work out the way we wanted it to.”
Carlton Cole
If a move to Celtic came too early for Pukki, then it probably came too late for former England international Cole. The one-time Chelsea and West Ham United targetman snubbed interest from MLS clubs to sign a two-year deal with the Hoops in the summer of 2015 but this proved to be was a classic case of delaying the inevitable.
Because after just eight months, five games and one goal – against lower-league Stranraer in the Scottish Cup – Cole was packing his bags and boarding a flight to Sacramento.
As far as Celtic transfers go, this one is best left forgotten.
Colin Kazim-Richards
35-year-old Kazim-Richards probably has a career waiting for him in the travel industry when he finally hands up his boots. Because few players have represented quite so many clubs – in quite so many countries – as a man who’s scored goals in France, Holland, Turkey, Greece, Brazil and Mexico.
Kazim-Richards short-lived stint in green-and-white, back in 2016, sandwiched spells at Feyenoord and Coritiba. It took just three weeks for Brendan Rodgers to decide, upon taking over from Ronny Deila at Parkhead, that the former Blackburn Rovers man was not up to the task.
Tyler Blackett
Big things were expected when Blackett arrived on loan in 2015 after a season of semi-regular first-team football under Louis van Gaal at Manchester United. The versatile, left-footed centre-back was dropped after a difficult debut performance against Aberdeen that really did set the tone for his time in Glasgow’s East End.
United reportedly considered re-calling Blackett midway through the campaign, such was his lack of opportunities under Deila. Now 28, the former Nottingham Forest man is playing on the other side of the Atlantic with FC Cincinnati.
Clearly, Celtic transfers don’t always succeed, even when they look like an inspired bit of business on paper.
Freddie Ljungberg
Another player who, like Cole, arrived in Scotland well past his peak. Ljungberg was 33 when he put pen to paper with Celtic, his dazzling performances in the red and white of Arsenal merely a distant memory. And if the Hoops were hoping that Ljungberg could emulate the impact of another Swedish legend – after inheriting Henrick Larsson’s number seven shirt – they were sadly mistaken.
“Of course it’s been frustrating not to play more,” Ljungberg admitted to the Daily Record at the time.
Diomansy Kamara
Perhaps inspired by the success of fellow mid-season arrival in Craig Bellamy, Celtic returned for another out-of-favour Premier League forward in the winter of 2010. It’s fair to say Kamara is not remembered with the same sepia-tinged nostalgia on Celtic Way.
The Fulham loanee made it clear that he’d have jumped at the chance to sign a permanent deal. After just two goals in nine Premiership games, however, Celtic understandably opted against meeting Fulham’s £2.5 million asking price.
Jeremie Aliadiere
One thing this seldom-seen septet should teach us is that, when it comes to signing strikers on short-term deals, Celtic’s track record leaves a lot to be desired. Aliadiere, a fresh-faced Arsenal loanee, joined the Bhoys in pursuit of first-team football. The fact that he was on the move again just two months later – after a pair of forgettable appearances – tells it’s own story.
“I thought; ‘Wow, what an opportunity to go to such a big club’,” Aliadiere told talkSPORT in 2018.
“Suddenly the club bought another striker, (Maciej) Zurawski. And then, just before the transfer window ended, the manager Gordon Strachan said to me; ‘We’ve bought this player. And because you’re only on loan, he will get more of an opportunity than you’.
“I straight away called my agent and we managed to move to West Ham on loan again for another season. I was gutted to leave.”
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