One headline signing — who also brings recent Champions League scoring experience with Qarabag — wouldn’t seem so underwhelming were it not for comparisons with last season’s two main title contenders.
City rivals Rangers, still stung by a late collapse to third, let head coach Danny Rohl leave for Wolfsburg and then poached Derek McInnes from runners-up Hearts. They’ve added seven players to the squad McInnes inherited, paying fees for four. Those include last season’s Premiership top scorer, Lawrence Shankland — whose move to Ibrox was agreed before McInnes’ arrival — and goalkeeper Ivor Pandur, fresh from helping Hull City return to the Premier League.
Hearts, meanwhile, have brought in 11 new faces, with transfer fees paid for five, balanced by the sale of the same number of first-team players. So far, the heavy turnover hasn’t paid off: under former Sint-Truiden boss Wouter Vrancken, they were thrashed 4-0 away to Sturm Graz in the first leg of their opening Champions League qualifier on Tuesday. Still, they’ll hope the Jamestown Analytics recruitment model has unearthed long-term value.
Elsewhere, Hibernian suffered a shock 2-0 defeat to Malisheva in Kosovo in their first Conference League qualifier, while Motherwell’s 2-0 home win over Faroe Islands part-timers HB was hardly convincing as Scotland’s hangover from another lacklustre World Cup lingers.
Celtic’s departures have mostly been players who spent last season out on loan, but they’ve yet to replace Kasper Schmeichel, who remained an international-level goalkeeper before injury ended his season and then his career. They also look set to be weakened further by the imminent £10m sale of Daizen Maeda to Ipswich Town — a fee Chris Sutton called “a bad deal” for the club, despite Maeda’s strong World Cup displays for Japan. The BBC pundit and former Celtic striker also predicts the 28-year-old will be relegated after a season in the Premier League.
In addition, O’Neill expects two midfield exits: Maeda’s international teammate Reo Hatate and Belgium international Arne Engels. The 73-year-old Northern Irishman also faced awkward questions about Kelechi Iheanacho’s departure. Celtic could have unilaterally extended the 29-year-old former Leicester striker’s deal but chose instead to offer new terms. Although O’Neill noted there are two sides to the story, Iheanacho’s decision to join Bursaspor — newly promoted to Turkey’s second tier — does not reflect well.
There is also speculation that captain and midfield mainstay Callum McGregor could be tempted by a lucrative late-career move to the Middle East.