Today marks four years since Odsonne Edouard signed for Celtic from PSG for a record fee but is Cameron Carter-Vickers our biggest statement of intent since?
After scoring 13 goals in 31 appearances for Celtic during season 2017/18, it was vital that the club could get a deal over the line for the French striker as we looked ahead to the following season.
We were teased with an Edouard and Dembélé partnership during the early Champions League qualifiers but in reality, Edouard had arrived at Celtic Park as the man to take the reins from his French counterpart.
On Friday evening it was announced that a deal had been done to permanently sign Cameron Carter-Vickers on a four-year contract from Tottenham Hotspur after playing an integral role under Ange Postecoglou in his maiden season.
There has been a number of hefty price-tags at Celtic over the past four years with players such as Christopher Jullien, Vasilis Barkas, Albian Ajeti, Carl Starfelt and Kyogo Furuhashi arriving at the club.
Already, two of those players have established their place in the first team under Ange with Starfelt and Kyogo becoming regulars. In contrast, Barkas has already departed on a loan spell to FC Utrecht while many fans would be content to move on Jullien and Ajeti.
All of these players arrived at the club having not already pulled on the Hoops meaning we didn’t really know what we were getting. Our signings under Postecoglou have been terrific but as new faces appeared on our social media feeds there was still much unknown about how the season would transpire after having such a disappointing campaign the previous year
Before Carter-Vickers put pen to paper, Jullien had been Celtic’s second highest fee arriving from Toulouse in 2019 for around £7 million. The French defender had some huge moments under Neil Lennon with his goals against Lazio and Rangers being remembered fondly. Since then, the defenders time at the club has been ravished by injury which has cast doubts upon his future.
During Carter-Vickers time at Celtic he has been consistently reliable playing 45 games and scoring four goals, which of course included his strike at Ibrox in the derby match in early April. In recent years, the club haven’t benefited properly from taking a player on loan and then signing them permanently which looks as though is now beginning to change.
With full focus now on the coming season which sees Celtic return to the UEFA Champions League for the first time since 2017, it is imperative that the club strengthens going forward which so far looks to be the case. There is still much speculation around Jota’s return to Celtic which I hope to be the case but out of both players, the USA defender was the most important one to get over the line with the add-ons involved potentially making him Celtic’s second highest fee.
The statement of intent making the former Spurs defenders deal permanent bodes well for the future as we move through this coming transfer window as I’m certain he won’t be the last in the door. Celtic mean business.
