Earlier this week we reported Arne Engels as a West Ham target after the club's post-relegation sales windfall. Now Celtic have already knocked back an approach, and Martin O'Neill says Everton have been in contact over Alistair Johnston. It leaves Celtic dealing with two separate pieces of transfer interest at once, with O'Neill making clear the club would prefer to keep both.
Celtic's line on Engels
The strongest part of Celtic's position is simple. West Ham's bid for Engels "doesn't remotely meet our valuation", which tells you this is not a case of the club entertaining the offer and asking for more. They have rejected it.
That rejection also sits against the background of Engels' recent usage. He has played 450 minutes across his last five matches, which is not the profile of a player Celtic are casually preparing to move on. He has also averaged 6.94 in that run, with a high point of 7.7 in Celtic's 3-1 win over Heart of Midlothian.
The earlier West Ham interest is not coming out of nowhere either. Nottingham Forest failed with a £25m offer for Engels in February, so Celtic have already shown they are not treating him as easy business. He joined from Augsburg in August 2024, and the market has been testing that resolve for a while.
Everton's contact over Johnston
The Johnston situation is less advanced, but it is live. O'Neill said: "Everton have been in contact. I'm not sure whether there's been a bid in there for that one, but they've been in contact saying that there would be."
He added that David Moyes called last week to say there would be contact, which suggests Everton have not been operating quietly here. The key point is that Celtic have contact, not confirmation of a bid, so that line should still be read carefully.
Johnston is not short on credentials. He joined Celtic from Montreal in January 2023, started all five of Canada's World Cup games and played 478 minutes at the tournament. That kind of reliability is part of why Everton are looking, and part of why Celtic may not want to make this easy.
O'Neill was blunt about the wider problem too: "difficult to stop people if their ambition is to play in a big, big league". He also said Celtic's job is to try to keep them, but that replacing players of this level would be difficult.
Celtic's recent league form gives them some leverage, with five wins from five in their most recent league run. But the transfer pressure is still there, and the next move will tell more than the noise around it. Everton have made contact over Johnston, while West Ham have already had their Engels approach sent back.
Written by Jack Mercer with AI-assisted research, cross-checked against 1 outlet. How we work →
