CELTIC manager Brendan Rodgers admits the loan market is fast becoming the only way for his club to access the best of Europe’s young talents, with clubs from major leagues snapping them up as early as 10 years of age.
Far from being despondent about accepting Celtic’s place in the food chain as a development stop for young prospects in the grand scheme of Europe’s top clubs, Rodgers believes they have to embrace it. The approach has allowed talents such as Patrick Roberts, and now Charly Musonda, to spend extended periods of time at Celtic, when they would otherwise have been out of their financial reach.
“We have to look at that market,” Rodgers said. “With Charly and Pat there were English Premier League clubs interested. We have every right to want to be in that market too. Those club will look after the talents, put them on big contracts, so you can’t buy them. If you have an opportunity to take that talent on loan, then I think it’s great.
“You find that with a lot of the big clubs. There is a player strategy around that. When they become available it can work for you.
“What has happened over the last five years in particular, is that clubs are having to get the players younger.
“Agents are on to players younger now, because the rules have slackened around that, governance around kids being moved so young.
“Clubs are looking at players younger and more seriously. Because they know that once they lose that player that’s it. Even at 10, 11, 12.
"It’s obviously very difficult for young players to get an opportunity in the English Premier League, but that shouldn’t stop you wanting to have them.”
Of course, it still isn’t a simple a matter to persuade these top clubs that Celtic should be the ones entrusted with the next stage in the development of what could be multi-million pound assets for them. But that is where Rodgers’ background and reputation for working with younger players proves so valuable.
“I have been managing for nearly 10 years now, so people know the profile or the brand of football,” he said. “My background was in youth development for 15 years and over the course of my time in management I have shown the faith both in youth and senior players.
“There is also a certain style of football that these players have to be developed in. If you are a big club you need to know that your players can play a certain way. You then pick and choose where the players go.
“When a player is coming to me at Celtic the [parent] club knows the method, the football idea and the developmental cycle the players will come into. So hopefully that helps Celtic.”
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 here