Lewis Anderson and Ben Banks sift through the Rangers and Celtic Deadline Day headlines as the January transfer window closes
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00:00Hello and welcome to the latest episode of our January transfer round-up. It's very much
00:09a wrap-up now that the window has officially slammed shut for the month of January. Of
00:16course we're in the 4th of February, the window carrying over. It was a fairly uneventful
00:23January window to say the least. Deadline day in particular, Ben Celtic signing Geoffrey
00:30Schlupp on loan from Crystal Palace until the end of the season. Predominantly left-sided
00:38player, vastly experienced Premier League title winner during his time at Leicester.
00:43He's kind of been on the fringes of the Crystal Palace first-team squad over the last couple
00:50of months, so I think he was very much keen to work with Brendan Rodgers on the opportunity
00:58to win silverware with Celtic. He's very versatile in terms of the positions he can play. He
01:05can fill in as a striker. Obviously Celtic didn't bring in a striker on deadline day
01:11much to supporters' frustrations I'd imagine. But what was your initial thoughts on the
01:17Schlupp sign and it all came about relatively quickly?
01:20I think Geoffrey Schlupp is probably unfortunate that the striker situation that I'm sure we'll
01:28discuss kind of happened as well because people are just raging about the fact that there
01:35wasn't a striker signed. Geoffrey Schlupp on the face of it until the end of the season
01:41he's not Keiron Tierney. But I think in isolation as a short-term option between now and the
01:48summer and who knows. I think he's out of contract at Palace so if it goes well and
01:53he's quite happy playing a bit of a bit-part role then possibly you get another year out
01:59of him because you need to remember Greg Taylor's out of contract at the end of the season and
02:03there's not really been any murmurings that he's going to stay. I still have a feeling
02:08he will but at this stage he's not signed so I think in isolation you're signing a guy
02:13who's won the Premier League, who's played at that level pretty much his entire career.
02:17Domestically he is going to be absolutely fine, no bother. Champions League level, less
02:24sure, he's obviously that's a bit of a jump if he needs to go and play against Bayern
02:27Munich but again playing in the Premier League you're playing that calibre opposition most
02:31weeks. He's not played a lot this season in turn I don't think he's started again but
02:35he's featured off the bench regularly. So I think in isolation as cover in the last
02:41day of the January window then you can't ask for much more in that position. Typical sell
02:48ticket as it comes with the January window, the deal has been reported as done for four
02:53hours yet it's not announced till one minute past eleven which was ideal for us. It's a
03:02good deal in isolation but ultimately and unfortunately for Geoffrey Schlupp I don't
03:06think that's the thing people are talking about. No, no I think it kind of flatters
03:11to deceive a wee bit. This is a guy who's 32 years of old, he's 20 caps for Ghana, that
03:16was a while back right and he's been at Palace since 2017. He does have over 250 games experience
03:23in the English Premier League so vastly experienced guy and probably good for Greg Taylor as well
03:29given there's a lot of uncertainty around his future but Taylor hasn't really been seriously
03:35tested it'd probably be fair to say. Alex Vai probably the closest, you think back to
03:40the left backs that have come in and challenged Taylor, they've never really laid a glove
03:43on him. You'd imagine a guy with Schlupp's experience that it'll be interesting to see
03:50how Greg Taylor fares over the next couple of weeks. Yeah I mean there's graphics going
03:56about I think these sort of AI generated graphics of Greg Taylor knocking out previous
04:03Celtic left backs to the floor but yeah nobody's getting near him. I can't really, there's
04:08nobody in my head even that jumps out as alright. He got close to it really. It's kind of always
04:15been Greg Taylor and that's just been Greg Taylor's position for a number of seasons
04:19now so he and Tierney coming in the summer I thought it was interesting that the club
04:23opted not to announce that as a pre-contract. There's maybe some tactics, Brent Rodgers
04:30has already said it's done, it's not like this is not public knowledge but you wonder
04:35whether they could have maybe worked something out there where they could maybe have announced
04:38that on deadline day. I know it's not a done deal but you know it appeases fans that there's
04:43an announcement, an exciting announcement of some sort so I'm surprised they didn't
04:47try and do that and they're just going to wait until the summer but with Geoffrey Shaw
04:52it's not like they need it for the league title. The league title's done, they're massive
04:55favourites for the Scottish Cup as they have been over the last decade. It's more for these
05:00games against Bayern Munich I think where Celtic fans are probably as positive as they
05:05have been when it comes to Champions League football and European football apartheid for
05:10some time that I think there's a feeling that they've maybe let the window pass them by
05:14and I know they signed Jota and that's a really good signing and certainly a Champions League
05:18level signing but you know Brendan Rodgers' big message during it was he wanted to end
05:24the window stronger than what they entered it and I don't think you can say Celtic did
05:29that, I think the squad is maybe a touch weaker.
05:32That leads us on nicely to the fact that they didn't sign a striker on deadline day which
05:36we all anticipated that Celtic would. Obviously a long pursuit of Matthijs Kvistgaarden who
05:45plays for Brondby in the Danish Super League. There was other names there as well, wasn't
05:52there? There was Zaid Inanusa who plays for BK Haken in Sweden. There was a variety, a
05:58couple of different names that we thought potentially on the back of the game against
06:02Motherwell. Rodgers made it clear that he was very much looking to bring in a striker.
06:07It would have been a loan deal rather than a permanent one but ultimately they've fallen
06:12short there. I guess that will be hugely concerning and worrying given that it will
06:18go into the second half of the season with only Adam Ida and youngster Johnny Kenny as
06:22backup as his only recognised number nines there.
06:25It could have been worse. There was talk of Johnny Kenny potentially going back to Shamrock
06:31Rovers and I think St Mirren was punted in some quarters. Daniel Cummins is pretty much
06:37West Ham bound. He never left on the deadline day but by all accounts he's away to West
06:43Ham in the summer and Brendan Rodgers being quite up front basically saying, you know,
06:47if you want to go and earn a few quid elsewhere then go ahead but if you want to be Carl MacGregor
06:51then stay at Celtic. So you've really only got two strikers. Daniel Cummins is there
06:58but I can't, I think you're going to see him get rocovatted a wee bit. Once it became clear
07:03he wasn't going to be in the picture, same with Daniel Kelly, they weren't even involved
07:07in B team games and things, they were just training at Lennoxtown until they went. So
07:11I think that will possibly happen with him but as you say what happens if Adam Ida picks
07:16up an injury or something, you're stuck with Johnny Kenny who has had a good time at Shamrock
07:21Rovers but I wouldn't say, you know, it's a bit of a step to go from leading the line
07:25for them to leading the line for Celtic. Dyson Maida probably becomes your striker option
07:30in a backup scenario but I was really shocked that he didn't because it wasn't even like on
07:35deadline day there was lots of rumours kicking about a striker, there was very faint talk of
07:41Danny Ings for the period of about 90 minutes until he was named on the bench for West Ham
07:47against Chelsea. Outside of that there was virtually nothing talked about about a striker,
07:53it was obviously Brendan Rodgers who made it clear but no names had hit the surface,
07:56no talk of anything really. The only name that sort of stuck yesterday was Geoffrey
08:00Schlupps and even the Tyrell Molassia stuff that had been doing the rounds a few days
08:05previous, that all seemed to go, it was very, very, it was strange, usually with Celtic
08:08more so than Rangers I find in my time covering Scottish football, you tend to hear a lot
08:14more names on deadline day as opposed to Rangers but it was very, very quiet and I think that's
08:21what, it wasn't even, it didn't even give, and I'm sure they were, they were obviously
08:24working behind the scenes on it and Brendan Rodgers is due to give a press conference
08:28I think today before the Dundee game where I'd be very interested to hear what he has
08:33to say there on the failed striker hunt because he heard them in the summer once it was, the
08:38business was getting so he didn't mince his words about the business that got done and
08:42then all of a sudden Arnie Engles got bought for £11 million so I was quite surprised,
08:49not just that they didn't sign a striker but just seemingly the lack of links to one that
08:53showed me. And across the city then it was a case of one in, one out, albeit not until
09:00the summer for Rangers, Zac Lovelace leaving Rangers, returning to his former club Millwall
09:07on a long-term deal, he was a player that was in talks about a contract extension but
09:13has ultimately decided that in order for regular first-team football he's got a better chance
09:18of going back down to the den. But the one piece of business Rangers did complete yesterday
09:23was a pre-contract agreement for Dundee midfielder Lyle Cameron, this one had kind of been bubbling
09:28away under the surface for most of January it's fair to say Ben, a player of undeniable
09:37talent, probably will obviously significantly boost the club's European quota heading into
09:44next season, he'll join at the end of his Dundee contract in the summer. What are your
09:51thoughts on this signing, there's kind of been a lot of rumours around whether or not he'll
09:55actually strengthen this group but similar to the kind of Connor Barron signing in the
09:59summer, what did you make of it? I think it's good for the UEFA quota, for academy players
10:07to step up they need to first of all be good enough and I think Bailey Rice has shown that
10:10he's good enough, I think Finlay Curtis has shown that there's a place for him in that
10:14set up, outside of that there's not really been too many that have stepped up and went
10:18right okay he's going to be a bona fide Rangers player and could potentially start games in
10:22the future, even Ross McCausland to a certain extent he has come in and did well but there
10:28are doubts over whether he's of the quality they need to really if they want to go and
10:31push on and win titles, play in the Champions League phase in seasons ahead. But I think
10:39one of the cornerstones that Koppen I think is trying to bring in is trying to bring in
10:44I think he said one Scottish talent every season and if that's the case to build up
10:49the UEFA quota it's not a bad strategy to have as well as sort of trying to buy low
10:55and buy young players and sell them on so I think it's a good signing domestically,
10:59I think European wise I do think it falls into the Connor Barron territory although
11:04I don't know how much it strengthens them there but certainly domestically Lyle Cameron's
11:07been great for Dundee, I've seen a lot of their fans not happy with Lyle Cameron in
11:12terms of pretty much asking for him to be bombed to the deserves, I did wonder once
11:16that was announced during the day whether there would be talks of a potential move to
11:20Ibrox quicker than anticipated but it probably makes sense for him to stay at Dundee, he'll
11:26play every week even if fans aren't particularly enamoured by the fact that this has been announced
11:30in January. It's a decent signing domestically, there's plenty of room to grow with him,
11:36certainly an interesting player and has been an exciting one to watch for Dundee so it'll
11:41be interesting to see how Rangers develop him and how he settles into life at Rangers
11:47because as much as Connor Barron maybe performance wise hasn't been like setting the heather
11:52alight, I do think he's settled into being a Rangers player so to speak in terms of handling
11:59the pressure and all the external stuff that comes with playing at Rangers.
12:07That's kind of fit isn't it for the month of January Ben, we were told that obviously
12:11Rangers were trying to possibly bring in a winger right towards late in the deadline but that
12:17kind of didn't materialise. Your overall assessment then on the January window from both clubs
12:23perspective, obviously Celtic bringing Xhota back, Schloop in the door and Rangers, Raphael
12:30Fernandes and Lyle Cameron on a pre-contract, what do you see as your overall summaries of it?
12:35Very quiet from both teams, especially Rangers. Rangers were very, very quiet,
12:40slight peek behind the curtain but we obviously see numbers wise how much folk are engaging with
12:46different types of content and it's the quietest I've seen it Rangers wise in a transfer window
12:53probably ever in my time working in journalism. I think even Rangers fans were quite, I think
12:59that said to me from the data we had that Rangers fans were quite happy with not really buying a
13:07lot because I think they've had the buying lots of players in the form of the Michael Beale era
13:12and half of them being not very good and costing the club a lot of money so I think they're quite
13:17happy for Nils Koppen to, if they need to go through the short-term pain then it is what it is,
13:24this squad that they've built just now has proven that it can handle the Europa League
13:29domestically, I think the league title is done, they will be second favourite for the Scottish
13:35cup so they don't really, it's not like you're looking at that squad domestically anyway and
13:40thinking right they need x, y and z to go and mount a title challenge, that's just not going
13:43to happen, you'd be better holding your cards to your chest a wee bit I think to the summer
13:47and for Celtic the signing of Iota is obviously a great one and bought the club some, you know,
13:52and they deserve massive credit for managing to get Iota in here and tearing it back to the
13:56club for under 50 million, for under 50 million, for selling them on for 50 million and getting
14:00them back for under 10 I think but selling Kiyoko, depending how the second half of the season goes
14:08is going to define how this window looks, if they go on and they win the treble and they put up a
14:16decent showing against Bayern Munich, not necessarily win it, just put up a decent showing then I think
14:19people will go right fair enough, that was probably the right decision to not, you know, just loan in
14:24somebody for the sake of loaning in somebody and holding back some cash for the summer window to
14:30buy your proper replacement, whether that be Kovacic or whoever it is, but if they go out in
14:34meek fashion to Bayern Munich, if they then drop it, not necessarily lose the league title but drop
14:41a few games in the league, they don't win the Scottish Cup, I think fans will be aggrieved and
14:48whether people think that's pretentious or entitled, I'm sure that'll get bandied about but
14:54I think that's how it'll play out, so I'd say Celtic was okay but the lack of strike on the
15:01final day is what's, I think, what could sting them potentially in the second half of the season,
15:06more so probably in the European scene than domestic.
15:10Well that's all we've got time for on today's show, thanks to my guest Ben Banks joining me
15:14this afternoon, stay tuned for more Football Talk over the coming weeks for your weekly
15:19lowdown on Celtic and Rangers.