Ange Postecoglou wants to add another midfielder for Celtic’s Champions League assault.
He’s been delighted at the impact Reo Hatate and Matt O’Riley have made since arriving at Parkhead in January.
Postecoglou expects another winter window signing Yosuke Ideguchi to do the same next season, while he already has Callum McGregor, David Turnbull and James McCarthy tied up.
But with Nir Bitton and Tom Rogic departing, the Celtic gaffer wants to strengthen that area of his squad further.
He said: “People will eventually figure out that I’m always trying to think a step ahead. The reason we brought in three midfielders in January was because I knew the likely outcome at the end of the season.
Get all the latest Celtic news sent straight to your Inbox every day by signing up to our newsletter.
We cover every morsel of information regarding your favourite club in the form of articles, videos and podcasts.
The newsletter will arrive every day at 12pm, giving you a round up of the best stories we’ve covered that in the last 24 hours.
To sign up, simply enter your email address into the link here.
And if you aren’t already, make sure you join the conversation over on our Celtic Facebook group and Record Sport Instagram.
“We wanted to be a step ahead in planning for these things [Bitton and Rogic going] so we’re not scrambling at the last minute.
“It’s about the future and that’s an area of the park we had to bolster. We still need to sign another midfielder but having signed the boys in January, it means they’re already bedded into our club. It gives us a head start.
“What we’ll look to do in the summer window is make sure the squad are stronger, more robust and increase the quality of our starting players.
“We won’t bring in as many, obviously, it’ll be more targeted.”
Celtic go straight into the Champions League group phase as reward for wrestling back the title from Rangers. Postecoglou admits it will make his planning easier for next season.
He said: “People focus on the financial rewards but, as important for me, we can put a pre-season programme in with certainty.
“There’s a whole range of benefits. It’s a great opportunity to accelerate our rebuilding of this team.”
