How is it that Italian clubs can spot Scottish talent, but Celtic can’t when its right under their noses?

I read an article this morning in the Record about Kieran Bowie and the reported interest in him from Celtic and the Ibrox side before his move to Hellas Veronas in Italy’s Serie A.

Now, Bowie makes it clear that playing for either Glasgow club was a non-runner for him because he wanted pursue a career abroad.

But it made me wonder why so much of our home grown talent has gone to Italy over the last 8 years or so?

And how is it that Italian clubs can spot these talents, but Celtic can’t?

Or won’t?

There has been this perception over the last 20 years or so that Celtic refuse to pay what would be considered big fees in the Scottish game for home grown talents.

I could delve into the John McGinn story, but you’re all blue in the face from hearing that one, so I won’t.

Every time home grown talents emerge, Celtic seem to baulk at the asking price Scottish clubs place on their prime assets.

But clubs in Italy don’t.

And more and more over the last few years, Italian clubs are recognising that young Scottish players are of a very decent standard.

The first trendsetter in all of this was Liam Henderson.

He moved from Celtic to Bari, who were then playing in Serie B.

Henderson established himself in Italy with Bari, and has gone on to play for Hellas Veronas, Empoli, Palermo, Lecce, and he is now currently plying his trade at Sampdoria.

Granted, he has mostly played in Serie B, but I think we would agree that Italy’s second tier is probably of a better standard than the Scottish Premiership.

After Henderson, the next to go was Aaron Hickey in 2020, who moved to Bologna.

He went on to become the first Scottish player to score in Serie A for 35 years.

Hickey, of course, spent 4 years from 2014 to 2018 at Celtic as a youth prospect, but never made the breakthrough at Parkhead.

He moved to back to Hearts, where he’d started his career in 2012, and made an immediate impact after his return.

His performances were of such a decent standard at Hearts, that Celtic supposedly came back with 5 or 6 bids for Hickey in August of 2020.

Knowing Celtic, they pissballed about as usual because Bologna came in with a paltry bid of £1.5 million, and the deal was done.

Hickey moved to Serie A, and played well for Bologna over a two year period.

This earned him a move to EPL side Brentford in 2022, where he has been plying his trade since.

Its clear that Hickey was a talented player, and one Celtic could have secured for a very low fee, yet somehow we managed to let him slip through the net?

Josh Doig, Lewis Ferguson, Lennon Miller, and Kieron Bowie are all players Celtic ‘apparently’ had interest in.

Yet every one of them has moved to Italy and gone on to play regular first team football in Serie A.

Doig is a regular with Sassuolo, with Ferguson well established at Bologna.

Ferguson recently won the Coppa Italia with his club.

Both Lennon Miller (Udinese) and Kieron Bowie (Hellas Veronas) are in their first seasons in Italy’s top flight, but both are playing regularly for their respective clubs.

Which begs the question, why didn’t Celtic ever table a serious bid for any of these players?

Its clear that they are all of a decent calibre.

Why is it that Celtic always baulk at the asking prices Scottish clubs place on these players?

Because its clearly been proven that they’re worth the fees being asked for them.

Lennon Miller went for £4.75 million, and Kieron Bowie went for £6.5 million.

That’s £11.25 million for two players who have gone on to prove they are good enough to play in Serie A.

When you consider we paid £10.5 million combined for Michel-Ange Balikwisha and Sebastian Tounekti, which is only £750k less than the amount paid for Miller and Bowie, wouldn’t you say Udinese and Hellas Veronas both got better deals?

We didn’t seem interested in paying Motherwell’s asking price for Lennon Miller, yet we wasted £5 million on Michel-Ange Balikwisha?

Who has contributed the square root of fuck all to Celtic’s campaign this season.

Sebastian Tounekti has been alright, but he has failed to consistently deliver.

We paid £5.5 million for him.

Celtic as a club has consistently turned it’s nose up at young up and coming Scottish talent because we won’t pay the asking prices Scottish clubs are looking for.

Yet we are happy to waste similar sums on players who have turned out to be utter failures at Celtic.

Michel-Ange Balikwisha is just one in a long list of players this club has wasted large sums on.

Yet all of the young Scottish players who have moved to Italy have gone on to prove themselves at the highest level in the Italian game.

Celtic could easily have afforded every one of those players.

Yet we refused to pay the asking prices for them because for some inexplicable reason, we feel home grown players aren’t worth that?

But time and time again, these kinds of players have proven they can make it at the highest level elsewhere.

I chose Italy as an example, as Italian clubs seem to realise that young home grown talent in Scotland is good enough to play in their environment.

But there are many more young Scottish players who have slipped through the net and gone on to be successful elsewhere.

The fact that Celtic allows all these players to slip through the net, while acquiring useless wastes of millions of pounds, shows that the current system at the club is totally unfit for purpose.

Its another reason why we cannot trust the current board to oversee the rebuild that’s required this summer.

We should be scouting homegrown talent all the time.

If Italian clubs can see it, why can’t we?

Well, I’m sure we can, but we refuse to pay their clubs what they’re worth.

As long as we behave like this, other clubs will continue to benefit from what we’ll miss out on.

That’s why we need change at Celtic.

This board is unfit for purpose.

Its time for them to go.

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