RONNY DEILA, the Celtic manager, has made it clear that he wants permanent additions to his squad in January, rather than further high-profile sales, after cooling talk of Neil Lennon luring Kris Commons to Bolton Wanderers.
Deila had his goalkeeper, Fraser Forster, offloaded to Southampton for £10m in August and there are fresh rumours over the future of Virgil van Dijk, the central defender who has been linked with a number of English clubs including Arsenal.
Commons, whose contract is about to enter its final six months, is also understood to be of interest to Lennon, but Deila insists everything is under control with the renegotiation process and is more focused on maintaining his current squad of players and bringing in existing targets on longer-term deals.
The Norwegian did sign the Serbian forward, Stefan Scepovic, from Sporting Gijon for £2.3m earlier in the season and secured Craig Gordon on a free transfer, but most of his work was done in the loan market with five players having arrived on such agreements.
Deila insists his team have now had ample opportunity to scout new talent in the necessary detail and believes he will find the January transfer window a much more satisfactory experience as he continues to build his team.
"We have the time to go out and watch players play live," he said. "That was not easy then [in the summer] but it is much easier in this window because they are now all playing and you can be 100 per cent sure those are the ones you want to go for. Things are easier and more predictable. Do we want less loans? Yes. Then you know what you have.
"We want to keep the best players and those who are performing and who we know are going to be important parts of the team and then add them to other players in order to progress.
"I know the club have the same idea. The first window was tough because everything was happening quickly and that is why we went for loan players rather than buying them. I think that was a good choice."
Commons appears no closer to extending his contract but Deila insists there is no reason for panic over the former Scotland internationalist's situation.
"We have good control in everything we do," said the Norwegian. "I am calm about that.
"We want to keep our best players and that is what we will be going for. It is football and you never know what might happen or what kind of bid will come in for your players.
"It is too early to say what will happen in January. We are thinking more about what we are going to do and how we are going to make our team stronger.
"Every window is going to be important if we want consistency and to be always improving."
Lennon, who took over at Sky Bet Championship outfit Bolton on Monday, is a huge admirer of Commons and is already being widely tipped to make a move to sign him in January, or at least make an approach over a pre-contractual agreement.
"I do not think I need to think too much about that," stated Deila. "It is still quite a long time until the window is open, so there will be rumours every week about who is going here and there.
"Interest in our players will not be a surprise because we have good players. We will have interest in players at other clubs, too, so it is give and take. I hope we can then be in a better position than we are now."
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