Celtic are closing in on the signing of Rubin Kazan’s Sead Haksabanovic as Ange Postecoglou sticks to his word of pursuing transfer business right up to the end of the summer window.
The 23-year-old Montenegro winger, who signed a new five-year deal last year, is training on his own in Sweden after spending part of last season on loan at Djurgården from the Russian club Rubin in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine. As Fifa have suspended his contract, Celtic could secure the player for less than his £6 million valuation.
Vladislav Zimagulov, the Russian transfer expert, said: “Rubin have agreed to sell Haksabanovic to Celtic. The clubs will agree a fully-fledged transfer, and not a loan.
“Two weeks ago it was written that negotiations between Celtic and Rubin did not work out allegedly because of difficulties with financial transactions. Now the clubs are close to an agreement and, apparently, have reached a compromise.”
Rustem Saimanov, Rubin’s general director, has revealed they are preparing to sell Haksabanovic because they desperately need the money. Confirming that two players — Haksabanovic and the Danish midfielder Oliver Abildgaard — can depart for the right price, he said: “We are in talks with both of them — of course, they both want to leave. But we aren’t letting them go for nothing because we want some money for them. We are waiting on bids.
“Our [finanical] situation is extremely worrying. Our budget has halved. I regard myself as being in a crisis management role. Our players all arrive for free now and no club has given us a single penny for transfers. We have been robbed by Fifa and Uefa.
“Everyone says that we have a big budget, but we also have big obligations. We have an academy which we spend millions of rubles on. Additionally, we have a women’s team playing in the major leagues. All this eats up money.
“And then we have obligations on loans that we don’t want, but you need to repay. We thought we could sell our best players for money which we didn’t get, the TV rights are down too. We budgeted for all this and got nothing.”
Celtic have already signed Benjamin Siegrist, Alexandro Bernabei, Moritz Jenz and Aaron Mooy this summer, and completed permanent deals for Jota and Cameron Carter-Vickers.
Matt O’Riley, the midfielder, has said that being able to rely on goals from right across the team is a key strength of Postecoglou’s side. Seven different players have contributed to the ten goals which Celtic have scored in their opening three Premiership fixtures, with the central defenders Jenz (twice), Stephen Welsh and Carl Starfelt among those to have found the back of the net.
O’Riley, who has yet to score himself this season, also highlighted the defending champions’ knack for striking late on — half of their goals to date have come in the final 15 minutes of games.
The 21-year-old said: “It’s important that we have a spread of goals from all over the team. That’s the case especially with the way teams play against us in Scotland. They really try to stop us from playing our game and we need to find a way past that.
“Take the Ross County game [a 3-1 win in Dingwall two weeks ago] as an example. They were following the midfielders all over the pitch. I would run out wide and that left Cameron Carter-Vickers [the centre back] with the space to run all the way up the pitch and shoot. That kind of shows that we will have to use as many options, and resources, as we can to score in certain games this season.
“Sometimes in Scotland, we need to wear teams down and then look for the openings after 60-70 minutes. Spaces can open up even more at that point and I think late goals could be quite common this season with the way teams are being set up.
“Being patient is important, we need to find the space when we can and then it’s a case of being clinical when we get the chances.”
The draw for the group stage of the Champions League takes place on Thursday, with the first fixture now less than three weeks away. Anticipation is already growing among Celtic supporters, but O’Riley insists that the players are intent on addressing business in sequential fashion.
“I haven’t actually thought about the Champions League that much,” he said. “We are very process-focused at Celtic and it’s very much about the day to day. It’s about training and preparing for the next game.
“We know the draw is coming up and there are going to be massive teams in it. When the group comes out, I will have a think about the competition a bit more. But this month has been about focusing on the league games every weekend. It’s all about the present and what we control.
“The next game is always the biggest at Celtic. That’s how it is. With the number of fixtures at this club, there is no other option. We could end up playing over 60 games this season so you can’t afford to think too far ahead.”
