Five players on loan and not a single penny spent… Celtic’s January transfer business was bewildering and reeks of cack-handed incompetence

Given that he has been doing umpteen different jobs since he returned to Celtic a few weeks ago, Martin O’Neill will be delighted to see the back of the January transfer window.

It has been a chaotic period which has effectively seen O’Neill operate as the club’s chief scout, sporting director, head of recruitment, public spokesman and football manager.

At the grand old age of 73, he’s been running around like a headless chicken frantically trying to get new players into the club.

O’Neill painted a very vivid picture a few weeks ago when he laid bare the lack of structure behind the scenes. Sitting in his office at Lennoxtown making phone calls late into the night, it was desperate stuff.

The list of potential targets that had been left behind by former head of football operations Paul Tisdale was discarded immediately. And wisely so.

It left O’Neill starting from scratch when he was reappointed on January 5 following the brief and bewildering reign of Wilfried Nancy.

Celtic chief executive Michael Nicholson has overseen another ugly-looking transfer window

Austrian striker Junior Adamu was one of FIVE loan arrivals to join up with Celtic this month

For a club of Celtic’s stature to literally have no recruitment network in place whatsoever should be a source of deep embarrassment. It also demonstrated that Dermot Desmond’s claims about the overall structure of the club being in good health were, in fact, total nonsense.

When Brendan Rodgers left Celtic back in October, Desmond took aim at his former manager in what amounted to a blatant and full-blooded character assassination.

Describing Rodgers as being ‘divisive, misleading and self-serving’, Desmond went on to defend how the club was operating behind the scenes.

‘What has failed recently was not due to our structure or model, but to one individual’s desire for self-preservation at the expense of others,’ claimed the club’s chief powerbroker.

‘Celtic’s structure — where the manager oversees football, the chief executive manages operations, and the board provides oversight — has served the club with great success for more than two decades.’

To claim that Celtic’s structure behind the scenes was in good health is laughable. The line about it serving them well for more than 20 years also did a lot of heavy lifting.

They dominated a league that had no meaningful competition for the best part of a decade, whilst building cash reserves of around £80million.

Arne Engels saw a £25million bid for his services from Nottingham Forest rejected by Celtic

As soon as Rangers have started to get their act together, along with Hearts mounting a genuine title challenge, Celtic have been found wanting.

Given the levels of finance available to them over the past 10 years or so, they should be light years ahead of everyone else in Scottish football.

They had a chance to build an empire. Instead, it has been a house built on sand, crippled by complacency and lacking ambition.

After yet another shambolic transfer window finally came to a close on Monday night, Celtic were once again left flailing around and rummaging the bargain bucket.

Everyone knew how important this January transfer window would be. The most important anyone can ever remember in Scottish football.

The destination of the league title could well hinge on the ins and outs across the three title contenders, yet it’s Celtic fans who will undoubtedly the most underwhelmed compared to Hearts and Rangers.

The news that they are exploring a move for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, currently without a club and available on a free transfer, sums the whole thing up.

Former Arsenal, Liverpool and England star Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain could yet sign for Celtic

Oxlade-Chamberlain is 32 years old and has been ravaged by injuries throughout his career. He hasn’t played a minute of competitive football since last May, before his stint with Besiktas was brought to an end.

It almost feels like déjà vu. Only a few months ago, after the club failed to land several key targets in the summer, Rodgers brought in Kelechi Iheanacho on a free.

Like Oxlade-Chamberlain, Iheanacho is a player whose career has been badly hampered by injuries. He did well when he arrived and scored a few goals, but has spent too long in the treatment room.

Yet, regardless of whether or not Celtic go on and sign Oxlade-Chamberlain, their overall business in January reeks of cack-handed incompetence.

That failure is not on O’Neill. He came in at short notice and did his best. Instead, it is those above him who should carry the can for this latest failure. The club cannot go on like this.

Michael Nicholson is hopelessly out of his depth as chief executive. In the absence of a sporting director, Celtic rely on Nicholson to broker transfer deals, a role for which he is patently ill-equipped.

On the back of the Europa League win over Utrecht last Thursday night, O’Neill had said with some confidence that ‘you wouldn’t be far away’ when asked about Celtic’s efforts to sign Damir Redzic and Fares Ghedjemis.

Frosinone winger Fares Ghedjemis had a last-minute change of heart about a move to Glasgow

In the end, neither of those players were signed. Seeking to bolster their forward line, Celtic instead opted for two loan moves to sign striker Junior Adamu from Freiburg and winger Joel Mvuka from Lorient.

Their other January recruits have been Tomas Cvancara from Borussia Monchengladbach, Julian Araujo from Bournemouth, and Benjamin Arthur from Brentford — all on loan.

In total, that’s five new players who were brought into the club — and not a single penny spent on transfer fees.

It doesn’t exactly scream of a club who were determined to move heaven and earth to give themselves the best possible chance of winning the league title.

A lot of it just didn’t make any sense. Why would Celtic send Stephen Welsh back on loan to Motherwell, only to then sign a raw and unproven young defender on loan in Arthur?

Welsh has been one of the best centre-backs in the league this season for a Motherwell side who have been flying. Surely it made more sense for Celtic to utilise him, given that he’s their own player and an academy graduate. Again, just a lack of joined-up thinking.

O’Neill was defiant yesterday and defended the club’s business. Especially Nottingham Forest’s blockbuster £25million bid for Arne Engels that was booted out.

Yet, on the contrary, the fact that Celtic rejected the chance to more than double their money on a player who was signed for £11m actually highlights the wider failings of their model.

Stephen Welsh has been impressive for Motherwell but has again been overlooked by Celtic

Engels is 22 years old and certainly has talent, but nobody should be under any illusions about his contribution throughout his time at Celtic since signing in the summer of 2024.

He hasn’t exactly shown himself to be a world-beater. Given the size of the offer from Forest, Celtic should have been absolutely snapping their hand off for £25m. That’s crazy money.

Had they been more nimble and agile in the market, they would already have had a replacement lined up for Engels and cashed in.

The Belgian midfielder would have been moved on, a new recruit would have come in for anything between £5m-£10m, and the cycle starts again.

That’s how proper clubs with proper recruitment models operate. But Celtic backed themselves into a corner with Engels.

In the face of such anger from fans, with O’Neill stating publicly on Sunday that he expected to hold on to the player, and with no replacement being lined up, they couldn’t dare sell Engels.

O’Neill praised the club’s resolve yesterday. He will hope that they have strengthened sufficiently enough to go on and win the league title.

If Celtic can do that, it would go down as one of his finest achievements with the club. He could walk straight into the boardroom and tell them where he wants his statue built.

But after another shambolic transfer window, it looks distinctly like a club icon has been hung out to dry due to the incompetence of those above him.