Shankland to Celtic? Stranger things have been known to happen

There’s been a lot of talk about Lawrence Shankland lately, mainly with regard to him moving to our main rivals.

The general consensus is that Shankland is a bluenose, therefore he would fit in well over at Ibrox.

However, from our perspective, that should not be an influencing factor in whether we went after him or not.

First and foremost, Shankland is a goal scorer.

He has 16 goals already this season and that is a commodity we need at this moment in time.

We know we are losing Oh Hyyeon-gyu to the upcoming Asian Cup.

This effectively leaves us completely reliant on Kyogo to score goals during his absence.

I highlighted the fact that the board have had plenty of time to prepare for this eventuality in yesterday’s article, but thus far, it appears as if they’ve failed to prepare for it.

Currently, there are two prolific goal scorers plying their trade in the Scottish Premiership.

Bojan Miovski, and the aforementioned Lawrence Shankland.

The asking price for Miovski is looking in excess of the £4 million mark.

Ironically, our board will most likely baulk at those kinds of asking prices for established players in the Scottish Premiership, but they have no issue with paying slightly less for projects.

With regard to Shankland, Hearts will be more amenable to doing business with the Ibrox side than they would with us.

But it would make sense to see what the opening bid would be, if the Ibrox side were to enter one.

If Hearts are looking for stupid money, then fair enough, we steer clear.

But what are the merits of signing a player like Shankland?

Is he good enough to play for Celtic, or would Mark Lawwell happily see him go to our main rivals?

Shankland has been fairly prolific this season, and he has done this with very little support from his team-mates around him.

In fact, the next highest scoring player in the Hearts side has the ignominy of his tally being in own goals.

That tells us that Shankland tends to carve out an awful lot of his chances on his own.

And if you look at footage of his goals to date, that is very much the case.

He tends to take a lot of speculative shots from distance, and to be fair to, a good portion of them end up in the back of the net.

He has scored twice against us this season.

His goal against us at Tynecastle came out of nothing, he received the ball, turned and fired quickly into the bottom right corner from outside the box.

At Celtic Park, he was left totally unmarked, and scored a poacher’s header from a corner.

Which shows he’s good at poaching goals.

But he also carves out a lot of chances for himself from unlikely situations.

He also scored a poachers goal against us at Tynecastle last season in our 4-3 victory there.

If Shankland was to come to Celtic, one major difference for him at Celtic as opposed to Hearts, would be the level of support he would have around him.

He would have wingers who are capable of delivering decent balls into the box for him, midfielders who could deliver a slide-rule pass to him, and all round, a much higher calibre of player surrounding him.

Yes, he may be slightly older than the age group we normally go after at 28, but Kyogo is the same age.

So, why then, are we showing little or no interest in a player who could do a job for us?

Is it because of his allegiances?

Which didn’t matter a jot when we went after Scott Allan a few years back.

In fact, it’s well known that we plucked him out from under the nose of the Ibrox side, just to spite them.

It can’t have been for any other reason, because he contributed little or nothing to the football operation.

But the big difference here is that Ibrox seems to want Shankland badly.

Would it not make it all the sweeter if we plucked him out from under their noses, and then had him score the winner in a Glasgow Derby?

Just to spite them, as well a secure a proven goal scorer?

We’ve never cared about players’ allegiances in the past, so why should we care now?

Craig Beattie, Steven Pressley, and Kenny Miller, along with Scott Allan, are all prime examples of that.

The reality here is that we’re well capable of outbidding the Ibrox side, if we really wanted to.

Which leaves the question, is that what Mark Lawwell would do?

Would he wait to see what Ibrox is willing to offer, and then come in with a better bid?

In today’s transfer news, the Ibrox side are reported to be after Josh Doig, Michy Batshuayi, and of course Shankland.

The only interest we seem to be showing lately is in Nicola Kuhn from Rapid Vienna.

Whether that amounts to anything, unlike all the other rumours, which have amounted to nothing, remains to be seen.

It’s also reported that Serie A and Bundesliga sides are showing interest in Bojan Miovski, which means he can’t be that bad after all.

Why then, would Celtic not show any interest in Miovski, or Shankland, for that matter?

Invest £4+million and get a return of £60 million when his goals help us into next year’s Champions League.

Not exactly rocket science, is it?

Maybe the club is fooling us all?

Perhaps behind the scenes, they’re monitoring closely what’s going on with both Shankland and Miovski?

I think they’d be stupid not to.

I reckon both players could do a job for us.

But hey, that’s just my opinion.

I’m sure Mark Lawwell has no opinion at all.

At least judging by the bucketloads of action we’re seeing this transfer window, that’s what you’d think.

Day 10, and still nothing.

Tick tock, tick tock…..