Is Celtic manager Ange Postecoglou running out of time to make good on summer aim?

The path of least resistance has never held any appeal for Ange Postecoglou.

The Celtic manager – a self acknowledged footballing purist – could be considered a Panglossian figure. Of sorts. He makes it his mission to look for the signpost proclaiming ‘best of all possible worlds’ and drives towards it. The difference with Voltaire’s character being that this is regardless of how exacting that might make matters. Case in point is the ideal scenario he set out for summer transfer plans. In the form of the timescale for reshaping his player pool set out as soon as the championship was snaffled a month ago. A prize that earned the whopping bounty of direct entry to the Champions League group stages.

Postecoglou determined in mid-May it was crucial to derive full value from that development through enjoying a month tuning up a fully-augmented squad. A high bar for a club where swift transfer activity has so often seemed anathema. “Our priority is to try to get that done early so that, come pre-season, with getting straight into the group stage, we’ve a really good opportunity to work with the group without the pressure of competition,” the Australian said then. “It would be great if we could have all the new players in by that time. Sometimes these things are taken out of your hands a little bit, but our intent is to try to get our business done early. We know what we need, we’ve already identified the areas we need to improve, so we’ve already started work on that.”

Celtic will return for pre-season training next Monday, those who have been playing internationals then joining up as a 10-day training camp in Austria is embarked on come July 1. Yet, as it stands, the £6million deal struck with Tottenham Hostpur for Cameron