LATEST DAIZEN MAEDA CELTIC TRANSFER STORY IS, ONCE AGAIN, TOTAL FICTION
- BY LIAM CARRIGAN
- Jul 29
- 2 min read
Sometimes I get a bit preachy when I talk about journalistic best practice. However, when you see the same people repeatedly make the same basic mistakes in their coverage of Celtic, it’s hard not to become that image from The Simpsons: “Old Man Yells at Cloud”
Today I’ve seen multiple sites running a story claiming that Daizen Maeda could leave Celtic, and is “stalling” on contract extension talks.
The story is a work of complete fiction. However, what I think is more important is to look at why this is the case, and how we can all do better by shutting this nonsense down before it gets any oxygen.
No Movement on Daizen Maeda Celtic Contract, Club Have Other Priorities Right Now
One of the most important points to remember here is that contract negotiations can be held at any time. The same can’t be said of transfer negotiations. Celtic have a deadline of less than a month to get players in before our Champions League qualifier, and we have about one week on top of that to bring in any players for the first half of the season.
In such circumstances, not even the Celtic board would have the myopia to sanction a Daizen Maeda Celtic sale.
The manager, and I think almost all the Celtic support along with him, would rather see these deals done over the next week or so. The domestic season starts this weekend, and Celtic need time to get new players bedded in before the European tie comes around.
This means that contract talks, be they for the manager or for star players like Maeda will just need to wait for the time being.
That hasn’t stopped this latest story from gaining traction though.
One look at the source alone should tell you it is nonsense. That source is Football Insider, an online peddler of the worst kind of gossip, heresay and conjecture with no actual evidence to back up what they say beyond “we believe...”.
In other words, “trust us mate, we’re in the know.”
If you believe that then by all means get in touch with us here at ACSOM, I’ve got some magic beans you’ll probably be interested in buying!
Again, it goes back to one of the fundamental rules of newsgathering. Does a story have multiple, trustworthy sources? In this case, no it doesn’t.
Every article I’ve seen scribbled out about this “story” so far cites the same original piece on Football Insider as their source. And even the Football Insider piece goes to great lengths to emphasize that “Maeda is still very happy at Celtic.”
So, don’t believe the hype, always check the sources. And for any Celtic sites out there choosing to run this as news, I say: “C’mon Bhoys, we should be better than that.”
