The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)

Lennon not expecting to do much business

-

Celtic manager Neil Lennon is not sure he needs to make any new signings ahead of their quest for 10 consecutiv­e titles.

And the Hoops boss will wait and see how the transfer market develops amid the coronaviru­s pandemic.

Lennon is set to lose loan players Fraser Forster, Mohamed Elyounouss­i and Moritz Bauer while the likes of Jonny Hayes and Craig Gordon are soon out of contract.

Lennon would no doubt be keen to keep Forster if a deal can be done with Southampto­n and he has other players in his squad who could offer more next term.

January signings Ismaila Soro and Patryk Klimala have yet to establish themselves and the likes of right-back Hatem Abd Elhamed and striker Vakoun Bayo were just coming back from injury when the Covid-19 crisis caused a suspension and now terminatio­n of the season.

Much could depend on how much interest develops in top goalscorer

Odsonne Edouard and the Celtic manager is happy to survey the scene.

Lennon told the PA news agency: “We don’t know how the transfer window is going to look and what length of time it will be, and what the budget is going to be, and what other clubs’ budget is going to be as well.

“I am really happy with the squad, I am not sure we need to do a lot of rebuilding at all, if at all.

“But again you don’t know what the landscape is going to look like with bringing players in.”

Monday’s decision to call the Ladbrokes Premiershi­p and declare Celtic champions has allowed Lennon to do some sort of planning.

“June 10 is the mandate, we can start training back in groups, whether that changes between now and then we don’t know, but that’s what we are aiming for,” he said.

“With the league finishing now we can hopefully get a start date for next season and look to build from that.”

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United Kingdom