Giorgos Giakoumakis, once hailed as a potent force in Celtic’s attacking lineup, has been the source of an on and off debate among the fanbase since his departure. The Greek striker’s move to Atlanta United after just 18 months at Celtic seemed abrupt, and his replacement, Oh Hyeon-gyu, struggled to fill his shoes immediately. This left a section of the support questioning the club’s decision to let Giakoumakis go.
Giakoumakis’ stint at Celtic was indeed impressive. He joined from VVV-Venlo in August 2021 for £2.5 million and quickly made his mark by becoming the joint top scorer in the Scottish Premiership for the 2021/22 season despite missing half the season through injury. His physical presence and knack for scoring crucial goals were pivotal under Ange Postecoglou’s management. Yet, despite his on-field contributions, he often found himself playing second fiddle to Kyogo Furuhashi, which fueled his frustrations and hampered any notion he was deserving of a much bigger wage package.
After moving to Atlanta United for £3.5 million, Giakoumakis continued to showcase his goal-scoring prowess, netting 24 goals in 43 appearances. His time in MLS further highlighted his capabilities, earning him the title of MLS Newcomer of the Year for 2023. However, his tenure in the United States mirrored his time at Celtic in one crucial aspect—contract issues. Reports of stalled negotiations and his push for a more lucrative deal have now led to his transfer to Cruz Azul for a substantial $10 million package. [Fabrizio Romano]
While it is natural to admire a player’s ambition to maximise earnings during their career, Giakoumakis’ pattern of seeking better terms suggests a certain mercenary aspect to his professional approach. This mentality likely meant that Celtic were always going to struggle to retain him long-term. The financial demands Giakoumakis would have made were perhaps unsustainable for Celtic, who have to balance ambition with financial prudence. The player seems to quickly agitate for a move once in the door.
Celtic’s decision to sell Giakoumakis, in retrospect, appears justified. Throwing significant money at a player who was not the first-choice striker would have been impractical. Kyogo’s consistent performance and Giakoumakis’ own contractual aspirations meant that parting ways was a the only sensible move. The loan signing of Adam Idah from Norwich City in January did eventually quell some of the pining for Giakoumakis. Idah felt like a slight upgrade on the Greek striker. The Irishman scoring pivotal goals to help Celtic to a league and cup double. Now, if only Celtic could get the big man on a permanent deal.
Giakoumakis: The Right Call by Celtic
So while Giakoumakis’ departure was initially met with some dismay, his career trajectory post-Celtic has validated the club’s decision. His moves reflect a player seeking the best financial deals, and Celtic’s choice to let him go rather than meet his rising demands was wise. Giakoumakis’ journey serves as a reminder that in football, sometimes the right decision isn’t always the most popular one.
Don’t agree at all.
Idah is not certain to stay, he always seems guarded when he has been asked by the media, and is unproven in the Champions League.
Imo Kyogo is too lightweight in the CL and
Giakoumakis looked like he could compete at that level.
Another year of being the cannon fodder for our CL opponents is not acceptable.
Hatate missed a lot of games and barely kicked a ball on his return and with O’Riley expected to leave for megabucks and the influencial Joe Hart retiring, I would like to think that the recruitment dept are working on quality not quantity fòr virtually all areas of the team.
New players will come and if they sign a three year contract both parties must realise it was signed with both parties happy unless there is a clause where a players form deserves another contract but there are players who will always chase better money especially older players either give them a better wage in which 6months time they will want more or sell him when his stocks high as Celtic done and now justified
Remember at the time that Ange gave us the impression, that if a player was putting money before the club, then we just moved on without any interest in the player?
Strange really when Ange ended up doing the exact same thing?
Think Rodgers is far more clued into the money factor regarding the wages of players imo?
Massive improvements are still required regarding the wage structure within our club?
Having so many players upon contracts, that don’t feature within the plans of the manager, is a ridiculous way to be operating as a club imo?
Certainly prevents growth in the wage budget for sure.
Every club has to operate with a certain amount of wasted money within the wage budget, especially as not every signing is going to be a success, which is part of the game anyway?
Yet when you start adding up the potential waste with contracts given out and no longer in the plans of Rodgers, then what is the actual figure upon waste while under contract?
At a total guess, I would say that we are way above 100k a week, so somewhere between 5 to 10M over the course of the financial year?
It may be a sustainable figure for the club at present, where you see the problems occurring within the clubs within the EPL and especially the scum, when you totally get that process within the club, totally wrong?
Yet we still have to be looking to make improvements now as this process of stock piling players within a sustainable wage structure has to be improved upon, especially if growth is to be achieved in attracting better quality players for CL level, within our wage structure and budget.
We have been very successful with creating a player trading model to compensate the ones that weren’t a success, but it has also prevented ourselves of Sustainability within the playing squad, with to much of a summer turnaround with players within the squad?
So massive work needs to done during the summer, to change the current structure that has been very successful at Scottish level, but some way to go before it’s in a far better shape for ourselves to be competing better at CL level with an overall squad in place, with a far better wage budget in place, to attract the better quality player with matching the wage demands imo?
Not a easy task, but certainly one that our club should be aiming to improve upon and achieve imo?
There only ever seems to be two options open to Celtic, increase wages and buy better quality players and go bust or spend little and pay little and stay afloat lol , surely there,’s a happy medium and I’m sick of hearing ” look what happened to Rangers” there’s a difference between managing a budget and going full on Sevco bat shit crazy with tax , EBT’s and a Stadium and team built on masses of debt.
There only ever seems to be two options open to Celtic, increase wages and buy better quality players and go bust or spend little and pay little and stay afloat lol , surely there,’s a happy medium and I’m sick of hearing ” look what happened to Rangers” there’s a difference between managing a increased budget and going full on Sevco bat shit crazy with tax , EBT’s and a Stadium and team built on masses of debt.