NEW Celtic signing Kristoffer Ajer is at the centre of a sportsmanship storm in Norway after the Rosenborg boss slaughtered him for trying to get players booked and sent off.
But the unrepentant 18-year-old insists he has no intention of changing his ways when he moves to Scotland in the summer.
Ajer has agreed a £750,000 switch to the Scottish champions, but will be under new management when he arrives after countryman Ronny Deila decided to quit.
He has just four games left in Norway before moving to Glasgow, but his conduct has been slammed by their manager Kare Ingebrigtsen.
Ingebrigtsen wasn't happy that Ajer was complaining to the referee his players should be booked and sent off for heavy challenges.
And he's advised Ajer not to do that in Scotland.
He pointed out: "I am surprised that at 18 years of age, Ajer runs about shouting that everyone should be booked.
"That surprised me. He complained that it should have been another booking after a small challenge from Jonas Svensson.
"If he starts that in Scotland, I think he will struggle.
"He was whining to the ref about people getting yellow cards. It's not his job to do that.
"I wouldn't even expect some of the more experienced Start players to do that.
"He needs to stop that in Scotland.
"Look, he's a good player and has everything in his game to be a success and I wish him good luck.
"But remember, he has a new coach to impress now."
But Ajer was unapologetic after the game, which Rosenborg won 2-0 to continue Start's miserable start to the Norwegian season as they remained anchored to the bottom of the league.
He said: "There were two tackles I complained about and I thought they should have been yellow cards, it was that simple.
"Both teams do that in the heat of the battle. If obviously affects the game if the opposition get a player sent off.
"It's not unsportsmanlike. I'm not going to stop doing that when I'm going to Scotland. All 22 players do it all the time and I'll always do it too.. It's part of football."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel