Celtic hit gold with a star who was sold for more than Van Dijk

Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers was heavily backed by the board in the summer transfer window last year as they made several big-money signings to bolster his squad.

USA international Auston Trusty was brought in from English side Sheffield United for a reported fee of £6m to compete with Liam Scales for a starting berth at centre-back.

The Hoops also agreed a £9.5m dealwith an initial fee of £8.5m, to sign Ireland international Adam Idah from Norwich City on a permanent basis, after he spent the second half of last season on loan and scored the winner in the SFA Cup final against Rangers.

Idah was not the only signing to threaten Odsonne Edouard’s club-record deal – A £ 9m MOVE from PSG in 2018 – as Belgian central midfielder Arne Engels arrived from Augsburg for a reported fee of £11m.

The 21-year-old talent has racked up nine goals and 12 assists in all competitions so far this season and has the potential to be one of the club’s next big sales in the future.

Celtic are no strangers to cashing in on their best players as they have made millions over the years by doing exactly that, with Matt O’Riley’s move to Brighton & Hove Albion last summer being the most recent example.

Celtic’s biggest sales

The Scottish giants have made a habit out of making big money on their stars and it shows that the club have an excellent recruitment strategy, as they have consistently found quality young prospects and developed them into hugely valuable assets.

O’Riley is a brilliant example of that because Celtic swooped to sign him from English League One side MK Dons for a fee of £1.5m in the January transfer window at the start of 2022, before going on to sell him for a significantly higher fee just two-and-a-half years later.

As you can see in the table above, current Celtic forward Jota, who re-joined the club in the recent January window, is among the club’s biggest-ever sales.

Kieran Tierney has agreed to join the club on a free transfer from Arsenal in the summer, which means that two of Celtic’s top three record sales will be back at Parkhead together for the 2025/26 campaign.

One player the Scottish giants may wish they could bring back to Parkhead is central defender Virgil van Dijk, whose move away from the club does not crack the top five biggest sales in the team’s history.

How much Celtic sold Virgil van Dijk for

In the summer of 2015, Premier League side Southampton swooped in to sign the Dutch centre-back for a reported fee of £11.5mwith a further £1.5m in potential add-ons.

The Hoops had signed the Netherlands international from Groningen for a fee of €2m (£1.7m), according to manager Neil Lennonahead of the 2013/14 campaign and this means that the club made a huge profit on him by cashing in for just shy of £10m more up front.

Van Dijk racked up a staggering 115 first-team appearances for Celtic in just two years at the club and contributed with an eye-catching 15 goals and seven assists from a centre-back position.

The giant central defender then proved his worth in the Premier League with the Saints over the next two-and-a-half years before being snapped up by Liverpool for a record fee.

According to BBC SportJurgen Klopp’s side made Van Dijk the most expensive defender in the history of the game with a £75m swoop for his services in January of 2018.

As you can see in the table above, the Dutch star has been included in the Premier League PFA Team of the Year in four of his six full seasons at Anfield, after joining them midway through the 2017/18 campaign.

Celtic, however, were once able to cash in on a centre-back for even more than they got for van Dijk, despite what the Dutchman has gone on to achieve, as they hit the jackpot with Kristoffer Ajer.

Celtic struck gold with Kristoffer Ajer

Back in February 2016, the Hoops swooped to sign the Norwegian giant for a reported fee of just £650k after a trial spell at the club from Start in his home country – a fee that would go on to look insignificant in the face of the money they raked in for his services.

The young defender arrived as a youth team player at first, playing five times in the UEFA Youth League in the first half of the 2016/17 campaign, before being sent out on loan to Kilmarnock to gain some valuable experience in senior football in Scotland.

Ajer returned to Celtic for the 2017/18 season, with Rodgers in the dugout in his first spell at the club, and emerged as a regular first-team player for the Hoops, as he went on to play 176 times for the Hoops in total throughout his spell in Glasgow.

The Norway international, who scored seven goals for the Bhoys, won three Scottish Premiership titlesthree League Cup trophies, and three SFA Cup trophies, which shows that it was a successful period for him and the club.

In the summer of 2021, Premier League side Brentford swooped in to sign the centre-back for an initial fee of £13.5mwith an undisclosed amount of add-ons that could increase it, which meant that he was sold for £2m more than van Dijk – not including add-ons – was six years earlier.

This shows that Celtic hit the jackpot with Ajer because they turned a £650k signing for their development squad into an incredibly successful player, given the nine trophies he won with the Scottish giants, who was then sold for a mammoth profit.

At the time of writing, the Norwegian titan is valued at €18m (£15m) by Transfermarkt. This suggests that the Hoops did well to cash in on him for an initial £13.5m as his value has only marginally increased over the past three-and-a-half years, whereas van Dijk’s soared to a staggering £75m in a similar timeframe.

Rodgers will, now, hope that he can help the current crop of Celtic youngsters to develop and improve, to the point where they go on to become the next big-money sales to propel their careers to the next level.