Rising star ‘targeted’ by Celtic as offers glimpse inside talks with £7m man

The Hoops are focused on Champions League action but there’s always room for some transfer speculation

Rising Lyon star Mahamadou Diawara, who is annoyed by his lack of playing time, is reportedly interested in signing a permanent contract with Luke McCowan and Arne Engels. Howeverin January.

Although Diawara was linked back in the summer, the transfer fell through, and the 19-year-old remained at Lyon while Brendan Rodgers turned his attention to other players like Luke McCowan and Arne Engels. However, according to L’Equipe, his “demands” for consistent first-team play have not been fulfilled, which has angered the teenager, who may try to pressure a move.

They say he has spoken to the club many times about it and that he is ‘annoyed’ he isn’t playing more. And they add that the prospect of a permanent exit in January is ‘gaining ground’ – with Celtic well-placed to provide him more gametime than he is presently getting, albeit he would be far from first choice with the outstanding midfield depth currently available to Rodgers. Given that the France U19 captain still has three and a half years left on his contract, Celtic’s best chance is to offer him a six-month loan with a buyout option.

In the meantime, Rodgers has revealed details of a conversation he had with Auston Trusty, a £7 million defender, just before the player joined Celtic. Knowing that three points would most likely be sufficient to secure a playoff berth with two games remaining, the manager was talking about their goals in the competition ahead of Tuesday’s crucial Champions League matchup with Dinamo Zagreb.
“The ambition is here,” he added. Everyone wants to come to Celtic to play in the Champions League and win trophies, and that’s our job, I told Auston Trusty when I spoke with him before he joined this team.

“So the players come in, they will feel that they want to be a part of that and then they join the ambition of the club which is to produce the best standard of performance consistently that we possibly can and that’s your day-to-day job. That’s how we work, our mentality, our focus and like I said you see the mental toughness within this team and that’s something that obviously you want as a coach, you want to have players that can adapt to your style, that have a winning mentality, that are hungry to learn and want to win and that’s the environment that we have.

“I think you can see from the rotation of the team that I have a real trust in our squad. The last time we played on a Saturday and played on a Tuesday night, we played RB Leipzig and we were brilliant on that evening and that was based around the players and what they give and the physicality that we can bring at this level, plus the changes that we can make.

“We have a squad that I feel that I can pick any team and the quality is there, the cohesion is there, the structure is there. If we need to make changes within the game, I know that I can bring players in and keep that intensity and keep the quality. We’ll always look to improve the squad as the windows go on, but where we sit currently, I believe we’re in a really good place.”