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Celtic poised for cash injection from defender Virgil van Dijk's world-record £75m transfer to Liverpool
Celtic’s transfer profits could multiply tenfold if their share of the cash from Virgil van Dijk’s move from Southampton to Liverpool should be supplemented by the sale of Moussa Dembele next month.
The Scottish champions will get a slice of the £75 million world-record fee for a defender paid by Liverpool, which could be a straight 10 per cent of the total fee or, more likely, 15 per cent of the profit made by Southampton on their original £11.5m investment, which would yield Celtic around £9.5m.
On Boxing Day, Brendan Rodgers played down reports that an £18m fee had been agreed with Brighton for Moussa Dembele, the 21-year-old French striker who moved from Fulham in the summer of 2016 on a four-year contract.
“There's been no contact between the clubs and Moussa is very much still a Celtic player. There is no fee, no bid, there have been no talks,” the Celtic manager said.
Rodgers added a caveat, however, when asked if Dembele would still be a Celtic player at the end of January. “I can’t say that,” he replied. I live in the real world of football and you can say things that make you look silly.
“Someone might come in with a bid that is an astronomical amount of money for the club and the player and, if the player wants to go, that's modern football.”
Were Dembele to leave next month, the addition of his likely fee to the Van Dijk add-on would leave Celtic at least £25m – perhaps as much as £35m – up on the deals and would widen the gulf between their resources and those of other Scottish clubs. In their most recent accounts, for the year to June 30, Celtic’s turnover was £90.6m, 74 per cent up on the previous year because of Champions League involvement.
Participation in the tournament group stage was achieved again this season and Celtic qualified for the knockout stage of the Europa League, where they will meet Zenit St Petersburg. Although the Van Dijk bonus will not be paid in one tranche, but in instalments as he makes appearances for Liverpool, the return from that deal, plus any that might be struck for Dembele, would significantly enlarge the club’s profit from transfers, which was given as £2.3m in the 2016-17 accounts.
The publicity generated by Van Dijk’s move is also valuable to Celtic in the implementation of their value-added transfer policy, for which the sales pitch to potential signings is that if a footballer prospers in the east end of Glasgow he will probably get Champions League experience and could attract the attention of Premier League clubs in England, to the mutual benefit of club and player.
Paradoxically, Van Dijk’s transfer has reminded Celtic fans of their team’s brittleness in central defence this season. Rodgers has moved to remedy the deficiency by signing Marvin Compper from Red Bull Leipzig, paying around £1m for the 32-year-old, a fee that will be recouped if, as expected, Erik Sviatchenko moves to FC Copenhagen once the transfer window opens.
Lately, though, another player has been seen at the heart of the Celtic back line. Kristoffer Ajer, now 19, was the youngest player to have captained a side in Norway’s Tippeligaen when he played a week’s trial with Celtic, after which he was signed from IK Start for a nominal fee which could rise to £650,000 with add-ons.
Ajer, who is 6ft 5ins tall, has made 11 appearances for Celtic this season, five of which have been in December. The game he missed was the 4-0 defeat by Hearts which ended Celtic’s 69-game unbeaten run in domestic fixtures – but he was restored after the setback at Tynecastle and is in line to make his Old Firm debut when Rangers visit on Saturday.
The Norwegian has caught the eye of Tom Boyd, the former Celtic captain, who now works as a pundit for the club’s online commentary team. “Kris has defended well in the past three matches, but there is also one asset he has from being converted from a midfield player,” said Boyd.
“He can step out with the ball at the right times and you can see the breaks that he makes out of the backline into advanced positions cause so many problems for opponents. Who goes to him? Who picks him up?
“So, on that basis, I can’t see any reason why he could not stay in the side for the Rangers game. I’m almost sure the manager would have no qualms about putting him in.”
As for Dembele, Boyd said: “You can’t see the manager playing Moussa and Leigh [Griffiths]. Moussa has not left this club yet but Leigh scored in the last game, so it’s a tough choice – but a good one to have.”