Brendan Rodgers’ first signings for Celtic

By Andrew Clark

May 20 2016, 6:44 pm

Brendan Rodgers is back in football management with Celtic

Brendan Rodgers’ first signings for Celtic are going to be crucial.

The Hoops this afternoon unveiled 43-year-old Rodgers as the club’s new manager, replacing Ronny Deila on a 12 month rolling contract.

The Northern Irishman’s first task will be in the transfer market where he will need to improve the current pool of players available to him.

The make-up of the northern Irishman’s new group is all wrong. Too big and stacked in the wrong areas, it left Deila looking like he had no idea what his strongest line-up was.

While short on options at the back and with only one credible striking option in 40-goal Leigh Griffiths, the new boss has 17 midfielders to choose from – plus another five out on loan at other clubs.

Rodgers will have to quickly strip out the dead wood and beef up the defence and forward areas.

Deila wasted almost £4million on flops Stefan Scepovic and Nadir Ciftci, with more spent on the likes of Tyler Blackett, Saidy Janko, Colin Kazim-Richards, Carlton Cole and Dedryck Boyata amongst others, who have all disappointed.

Rodgers next must produce a much better success rate in the transfer market.

At Liverpool, Rodgers, alongside the transfer committee of Michael Edwards, Ian Ayre, Michael Gordon, Dave Fallows and Barry Hunter, oversaw the signing of 33 players.

Those signings totalled an eye-watering £292,050,000. Safe to say Rodgers is aware his budget won’t be anywhere near as generous in the east end of Glasgow.

Listed below are his Liverpool signings – Philippe Coutinho and Daniel Sturridge proved to be inspired purchases but the likes of Oussama Assaidi, Iago Aspas and Mario Balotelli didn’t work out quite so well.

His first Liverpool signings were players he knew well and believed he could rely on but who ultimately disappointed, in the shape of Fabio Borini and Joe Allen. Celtic fans will be hoping that Rodgers’ first Celtic signings have more of an impact than his initial forays into the transfer market with Liverpool.