CELTIC target Marcel Halstenberg has insisted he wants to stay at St Pauli for another season before earning a big-money move.
The Parkhead side have been strongly linked with a transfer for the 23-year-old left-back, but face competition from two other German sides.
But they have been dealt a setback in their pursuit of the player after Halstenberg revealed he wanted to remain at the Hamburg outfit.
He said: "The situation is that I am happy at St Pauli and want to stay here.
"I have decided to say no more about possible transfers because I want to give it full throttle for my remaining year at St Pauli.
"The prospect of a transfer to a bigger club in a year is of course attractive.
"But right now I want to take the next step with St Pauli.
"I feel really comfortable here and I would have to consider any change in my team very carefully."
Hannover and Red Star Leipzig are also keen on Halstenberg, who enjoyed an excellent season in Bundesliga II.
St Pauli have made it clear they are in no rush to sell their star player and would be prepared to allow him to leave for nothing once his contract runs down in a year.
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 hereComments are closed on this article