The Manchester Evening News, which gives balanced coverage  all the teams in the Greater Manchester area, is reporting that Manchester City have contacted Celtic over the possible sale of Moussa Dembele, who used to be quite good, and have been told they’re not getting him for cheap.

One of Brendan Rodgers strong points at Liverpool was that he tended to get good money for players he sold, especially to Manchester City. to get £49m for Raheem Sterling without being in possession of photographs of the Manchester city board involved in illegal and unhygeinic acts of a sexual nature is quite an achievement.

He isn’t going to change now he’s at Celtic. The paper used this quote to establish that;

“Celtic will never have to worry about having to lose anyone for a sum of money that’s not relative to the talent.

“Gone are the days when someone’s going to look at the Scottish market and think: “We’ll get someone out of Celtic because it’s Scottish football …”

‘A talent is a talent and, without being arrogant, I know what it looks like. World class players. I know what talent’s like.”  

Liverpool. Manchester United and anyone else who is interested will have go the message.

About time too, and its just a shame he wasn’t around when the club sold Virgil van Dijk to Southamptim, as part of a sneaky bid to get a team in the EPL. Manchester city have started the bidding for the big Dutchman at £40m, and there’s no reason to expect that to be the final bid.

All of which, of course, due to a sell on fee cleverly inserted by Peter Lawwell, there’ll be another few bob in the kitty to buy players with, should Rodgers feel like bringing anyone else in.

Someone who might not command the same sort of fee as Dembele is Efe Ambrose, who will almost certainly go next month, and its just a matter of where. He spoke to the somewhat ironically named owngoalnigeria.com about his future;

” Yes I have contact with Marseille but nothing concrete yet, we will know more in the coming days but for now am still at Celtic where am hoping to give my best to force my way back into the plans of the manager”, 

Maybe someone should tell him…

The likeable big guy continued;

 I have been linked with a host of English Championship teams and they are one of them, but like I said am under contract with Celtic for the next six months. I can’t really say much about other teams that have made move for me.

” The idea is to get back playing, be it with Celtic or any other club. I just want to play football, I still have dreams of representing Nigeria at the 2018 World Cup and playing regularly will boost my chances”.

The only way he will get back into the team is of all the other defenders are in some sort of car crash, and interestingly, they were all told last month to travel separately, even if it was just to the shop.

Darlington Nagbe looks set to be the first siging of the window, you’ll remember him…he was the one who told anyone who would listen that as long as the clubs agreed a fee he wanted to come to Glasgow while he was at the airport on his way home after watching the Barcelona game.

 By watching Barcelona against Celtic he got a head start on what it would feel like to be a player, as the others have already done this earlier in the season.

He may not be of the same class as Stuart Armstrong, Scott Brown and Nir Biton, but he’ll sell more shirts in the USA than all three combined, and thats what counts.

The US market isn’t like the rest of the world. Thousands over there already support Celtic, and signing a US player isn’t going to change that.

And anyway,  oligarch Donald Trump is going to put an enormous levy on anything we sell over there, though he is reportedly happy that a black fellow is leaving the country.

There have been numerous others mentioned, and as soon as we hear anything that isn’t already out there, we’ll let you know.

This window is important, as any new players will be looking to gel before the assault on Europe begins in the summer. Rodgers is also looking at what he already has, as with other teams more or les needing snookers already to overtake Celtic at the top of the league, he has a chance to see how a few youngsters get on.

Calvin Miller was the first against Partick, but he won’t be the last..

Between now and the end of the season, more young players will get opportunities, I am pretty certain of that,”

There’s nothing that warms the heart so much as watching one of our own make the grade, and its wonderful to see Celtic putting so much effort into unearthing the new John Fleck or Lewis McLoed.

Tomorrow Celtic travel to Hamilton for yet another game, and the manager had his usual moan about the artificial pitch;

“It is always difficult,” “Any coach or manager will tell you, it is always a different game on a plastic pitch.

“I have yet to see a good game on a plastic pitch but I have to respect that the conditions for every club are different.

“Hamilton are a football club that has produced many great young players so they have a way of working and that’s what works for them, which is absolutely fine — I respect that.

“Most coaches will tell you the plastic pitch isn’t ideal and that’s where you feel for supporters because are they seeing the best game of football possible?

“For us, we have to turn up, be professional and look to get the job done.”  

With so many games this month, one concern for Rodgers must be injury to his players. There is always more chance of strains and tears on the plastic, and it must be in the back of his mind that any young player starting for the first time would be significantly at risk of injury, and so you can see his point about it interfering with his plans. 

James Forrest will return , though Tom Rogic will miss out again, and I’d like to see the three wingers interchanging in the line behind the striker. After all, they are all bright enough and quick enough to bamboozle a defence, and that might be a useful tactic in Europe next year, which would wrongfoot a few clubs. 

Elsewhere, and one of the good things about Celtic that makes us all glow a little is the Celtic charity Foundation. They do a lot of unsung work, and their recent Christmas appeal 

has once again done us all proud. I had a wee look on the official website for their report on the maginificent effort this year,

 This is from The Evening Times.. even they noticed and praised the effort.

MORE than £220,000 has been raised for the 2016 Celtic FC Foundation Christmas Appeal – their most successful to date.

In less than two months, the staggering total was raised through the collective of supporters, the club, manager Brendon Rodgers, players, and directors.

Around £78,000 was given to local families with children, £5,000 to local pensioners and children’s charities received £45,000. 

A nice wee bit of publicity for the cause from the Glasgow paper, which , in the interest of fairness, had to give equal coverage to the other lot in the city, with this piece masquerading as news..

Rangers v Motherwell Scottish Cup tickets available next week

RANGERS supporters can buy tickets for the William Hill Scottish Cup game against Motherwell from Tuesday, December 27.

The fourth round match between the Ladbrokes Premiership rivals will kick-off at Ibrox at 12.30pm on Saturday, January 21.

Season ticket holders will have until Thursday, January 5, to buy their own seat. A full public sale will commence on Friday, January 6.

Tickets cost £20 for adults, £15 for concessions and £7 for juniors and can be purchased by calling the ticket hotline on 0871 702 1972 or by going to the Rangers Ticket Centre.

Astonishingly, Matthew Lindsay, a proud and respected journalist,

put his name to it.

With guys like that in the SMSM , then no wonder we’re having to do all the work on SFA corruption or collusion ourselves.

The club would like you to know that the shop is still open so you can spoend a few quid before Santa appears..

There’s still time to shop with Celtic this Christmas

IF you still have some last-minute gifts to buy then don’t worry, there’s still time to shop with Celtic this Christmas!

Shop Online
Visit the Online Superstore and place your order before 6pm today (Friday, December 23) and choose Express Delivery to have your gifts delivered in time for Christmas.

Shop now at celticsuperstore.co.uk

Shop In-Store
There’s a huge selection of great gift ideas available when you shop in-store with Celtic with all stores open until  5pm on Christmas Eve.

From 2016/17 Replica Kit and Training Wear to 2017 Annuals and Calendars, plus a huge range of commemorative gifts to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Lisbon, we’ll help you find the perfect present for your Celtic supporting friends and family this Christmas.

You can also pick up the Christmas Special Celtic View, available in all stores – a perfect stocking filler.

This Christmas edition is one not to be missed as it’s jam-packed and brimming with festive features and prizes galore as well as coming with a GIANT A2 poster featuring the highlights of the season so far AND the 32-page Celtic View Year Planner. 

One punter, however, wasn’t overly thrilled with the service on offer, and if he’s reading this, could he put the full story in the replies ?

The thread this appeared on contained some worrying accusations about customer service and the behaviour of the “security ” staff in there, so if anyone has any further stories please let us know, and I’ll put them to John Paul Taylor. 

I’m still upset at the piss poor fridge magnet I bought the other week, so there’s little chance of me buying anything else off them. Unless they restock on Fergus McCann bunnets. I left my last one hanging above the bar in a “rangers ” pub in Lanzarote. 

Ach, its christmas, and some gifts are better than others, and last so much longer.. 

The competition between Little Mix and “rangers ” fans for the Christams number one continues..

and with those attractive young lassies winning the visual battle 

the Ibrox support pulled out their response… 

Oh, speaking of which, who did this to the humble abide of Jimmy Bell ? The “rangers ” kitman presumably upset at the little play on words when he got home the other night. 

Actually, thats not his house, and has nothing to do with him. but it would have been funny if it was. 

And by the way, thats not a request for someone to play a childish prank and do that to his house. That would be out of order. 

And anyway, its just as funny to pretend its his house. 

There was no diary yesterday as I was a little tired after our works Christmas do, which had a free bar. 

so we go back to Wednesday for this one…