BRENDAN Rodgers, the Celtic manager, last night declared that Moussa Dembele, his leading goalscorer, is capable of playing up front for France in the future.
Dembele took his tally for the 2016/17 campaign to 23 with his second-half hat-trick in the 5-2 victory against St. Johnstone at McDiarmid Park in Perth last Sunday.
The 20-year-old, who has been heavily linked with a £40 million move to Chelsea in the summer, has played four times for his country’s under-21 side this season.
However, Rodgers, who will be hoping the forward can continue his hot streak of form in the William Hill Scottish Cup fifth round match against Inverness Caledonian Thistle at Parkhead today, believes the youngster can represent his full national team.
“He’s got huge potential,” he said. “ He’s just turned 20 years of age. I’ve worked with some really top young talents. I took (Philippe) Coutinho from Inter Milan at 19, (Raheem) Sterling at 17, Suso I put in the team and he’s at AC Milan now.
"Moussa’s certainly up there with the big talents. He has a fantastic mentality which helps him. He has talent but he’s also very focused on being a footballer.
“There’s no doubt in the next decade he’ll be leading France and being a real reference for the full national team.
“If he keeps the mentality that he has now, which is to work, to improve and be better, then he can achieve what he wants to achieve. He has all the qualities and he’s a good guy as well.”
Dembele, who signed for Celtic from Fulham for just £500,000 in the summer, has scored five goals in three games against Rangers this season, including a hat-trick in a 5-1 win at Parkhead back in September.
Rodgers believes there are areas of his game he still improve – but admitted the Scottish champions would find it difficult to hold onto him with the money that will be on offer to him in richer leagues around Europe.
“We do a lot of work looking to improve his movement, his finishing, his game intelligence and his understanding of the game in the different moments,” he said.
“We do a lot of work on being clinical in the box. He scores lots of goals from inside the box. We try and improve his link-up play outside the box and give him an understanding of pressing the game.
“But he’s got so many big qualities. His base is really good. It’s just about improving. But that will come with playing games and getting more experienced at the highest level.
Rodgers added: “The experience of when you leave Celtic there are not many bigger in the world in terms of the club or the supporters. There are of course different leagues and with the Premier League comes finance.
“It’s not that Celtic can’t keep them, if the player earns a certain amount of money and gets offered more then the likelihood is they will go. That’s not Celtic’s problem, that’s just the market that we live in.
“They certainly won’t leave to go to a bigger club, but there may be a greater financial package for them. Naturally I think most people would go.”
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