ANGE Postecoglou believes that strengthening his Celtic squad early will enable his new signings to make an impact during a vital run of January fixtures - but refused to rule out doing more transfer business this month.
Postecoglou has brought in Alistair Johnston, Tomoki Iwata and Yuki Kobayashi and could hand defenders Johnston and Kobayashi their debuts against Rangers in the cinch Premiership match at Ibrox tomorrow afternoon if their international clearance comes through from FIFA in time.
The Parkhead club were transformed by the arrival of Reo Hatate, Daizen Maeda and Matt O’Riley this time last year – they went on a 17 game unbeaten run in the league and reclaimed the Scottish title in May.
The Greek-Australian coach, whose team is nine points clear at the top of the Premiership and through to the Viaplay Cup semi-final, is hopeful that his trio of new recruits can also make an immediate impression and increase Celtic’s chances of landing silverware.
“The way I saw it was that it worked well for us last year and there was an opportunity there again,” he said.
“When you’re doing business in January, particularly in Europe, then it’s very hard to get it done early. Most clubs that you’re dealing with try and drag it out to the last day. So you are kind of missing out on another month of football.
“The Asian leagues all finish up in October or November. So if you have an interest there it means you can do your business before the January window opens. That allows players to come in and contribute during that month. It’s a pretty important month, there is always a lot of football and important games.
“They have to be the right players for us and with the three we have signed we could get them over early. Tomoki is not in the country yet. We’re hoping he’ll be here early next week and then he will probably need a couple of weeks of work.
“Alistair and Kobayashi have already had a couple of weeks but Tomoki will need a couple of weeks with us. But him coming in early January means that hopefully by the end of the month he will be ready.”
Postecoglou is satisfied with the options that he has in every position and is not anticipating a particularly stressful January transfer window – but he admitted that Celtic could strengthen further if a player he likes becomes available.
“There is no great urgency now,” he said. “I’m really pleased with what we have done so far. That relieved us of any urgent stuff we needed to do. I just felt we needed to bring two or three more in because of what is ahead and what we are trying to build. But the window isn’t even open yet.
“We’ll wait and see. If there is an opportunity to bring somebody in who we think can make us better then we will definitely explore it, but without the sense of urgency we’d have if we hadn’t already got some business done.”
