After repeated betrayals, when he trusted the Celtic board to sign replacements, Brendan Rodgers made his feelings very clear on Friday when he was asked for an update on the imminent transfer of Adam Idah.
Celtic had already briefed their favoured messengers about the transfer, the player was in South Wales, discussing terms and undergoing a medical.
Those events took place on Thursday, the day after Celtic returned to Glasgow after losing out on a £40m Champions League place to Kairat Almaty after going 210 minutes without scoring against the champions of Kazakhstan.
Rather than trying to strengthen the Celtic squad, to try and improve on eight months of weakening the team as part of a vendetta against Rodgers, Nicholson spent last week working on the sale of Idah to further alienate and undermine the manager.
Rodgers had to deal with Idah on a daily basis, to try and get the best out of a player who had been the subject of an orchestrated campaign from inside the club to trash his ability, performances and attitude.
The guy that had salvaged the 23/24 season, delivering a double for Celtic to deny Phil Clement a treble.
Last season Idah scored three goals from starting in three Champions League matches and coming off the bench in the seven others, he played the key role in the own goal from YB Bern that created Champions League progress as Nicholson finalised the sale of Kyogo Furuhashi to Rennes.
Yes, that guy. Adam Idah, a striker who delivered.
Unlike Albian Ajeti, Patryk Klimala, Vakoun Bayo, Mo Bangura, Teemu Puki, Amido Balde and various other disastrous ‘strikers’ signed by a previous CEO.
On Friday at his media conference Rodgers made it very clear that Idah couldn’t be sold without having his replacement signed and sealed.
That night Idah returned from Wales, shortly before Monday’s 7pm transfer deadline Swansea announced that they had their man. Nicholson had still failed to bring in a replacement.
The first question at Friday’s media conference was about Idah.
QUESTION: Can we get an update on Adam Idah’s future? I believe he’s away down to have a medical at Swansea. Is that correct?
RODGERS: There’s interest in Adam but, obviously, no one can leave here unless we get players in to replace. It’s as simple as that. There’s been negotiations and chatter around it, but I have to have players in here before I can consider letting anyone go.
QUESTION: Is that a big concern just given the fact that you’ve been wanting to strengthen your front line for quite a while now and there’s now talk of potentially Adam and I think there was a link to Yang in Birmingham today as well?
RODGERS: It’s been ongoing for Yang for a little while. I understand that when you’re a player that’s probably been mostly used as a squad player over a couple of years, there comes a point in time and then you maybe want to move on and play.
But I’ve been unable to do that because we’ve needed Yang here. I also know that if he does stay, he has a contribution to make because we need five, six wingers because of the number of games we play, the intensity that we want to play. But there has been interest in him. Yet again, I repeat, I can’t really do anything unless we have players in.
QUESTION: There’s a lot of uncertainty when it comes to Adam. Obviously a big game on Sunday. Do you know whether you’ll have him available or not definitively either way?
RODGERS: Adam had been out for a number of days before the last game and came in. I’m quite relaxed on that. I just need to see what we’re at over the course of next couple of days and then we’ll just we’ll assess it from there.
Thank you and good luck to Adam Idah, who has joined Swansea City on a permanent transfer.#CelticFC🍀 https://t.co/8znD8WYSld pic.twitter.com/Rj2UY7q8dP
— Celtic Football Club (@CelticFC) September 1, 2025
Despite that warning from Rodgers, Nicholson refused to make any changes to his policy.
Idah could have been sold to Swansea without much of an issue if a competent replacement had been brought in.
Kasper Dolberg’s name had been leaked to a friendly reporter on Thursday night, it provided a useful deflection, giving the impression that Celtic were working hard, looking to sign known quality.
Even after Rodgers’ comments on Friday there was plenty of time for Nicholson to salvage things, an extra £1m to Anderlecht and an additional £200,000 a year to Dolberg in wages and he could have been signed on Saturday and named on the bench at Ibrox on Sunday.
It seems that Celtic’s £1m a year CEO took the weekend off, he didn’t even bother turning up at Ibrox on Sunday to watch the biggest domestic game of the season.
To the surprise of no-one Dolberg’s agent had a very busy weekend, he lined up a deal with Ajax, a former club involving less hassle, politics, grief and upheaval than Celtic. In a World Cup season these things matter.
When Nicholson returned to work on Monday by the time he contacted Anderlecht it was too late, Dolberg was set on joining Anderlecht which meant that the bottom of Celtic’s short list had been reached.
Following that news Celtic were inundated by offers from clubs and agents desperate to squeeze a final deal out of the window.
David Datro Fofana was the name that appealed to the Celtic transfer strategy, contact was made, the messengers alerted that there was a cunning plan. And then Charlton Athletic struck a deal to sign Fofana from Chelsea!
Next up Nicholson turned to Kelechi Iheanacho, the former Leicester City striker that turned Celtic down in January in favour of Middlesbrough where he scored one goal across 15 appearances.
After failing with three offers to buy the player from Sevilla Iheanacho terminated his contract with the Spanish club, now there are only the laboured negotiations with Nicholson to be completed before he becomes a Celtic player.
Rodgers now has strong grounds to walk away, Terminado II can be carried out with his head held high. Even someone that enjoys the Martyr role has surely reached breaking point with the betrayal of his CEO, effectively ignoring the manager and the team sheet in order to further boost his cherished bank balance.
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Unless there is a last minute signing, I don’t see how BR can continue in the job after making that statement – the board have hung him out to dry here.
— Walfrid1888 (@Br_Walfrid) September 1, 2025
4 Comments
by Redmond
This goes back longer than our invisible man CEO has been in charge – He is a puppet for DD… He is the REAL reason for this annual disgrace. Until enough shares are able to be brought together to challenge him, absolutely NOTHING will change 😡
by Terry
If I was Brendan I would go up to Michael and punch that smug look of his face.
There should be an emergency board meeting today to investigate why things are so bad, and not to throw Brendan out to answer the questions. The board have been sitting there giving it high five we have over 100 million in the bank and they don’t give a toss about the team.
The fans love Celtic the board are only interested in their bonuses. Things have got to change, but as normal nothing will happen
The board are using the fans as cash cows, it’s time the fans fought back
by Bhoy4lufe
Russell Martin might be getting pelters from the stands but if you were him today, what board would you rather be working for?
by Iain Fergusson
Nickyerdosh, Nicholsan is a charlatan about as much use as a chocolate fireguard.