Manchester City hand Celtic Champions League bonus

Manchester City have done Celtic a £16m favour by signing Benfica midfielder Javi Garcia.

The Spanish internationalist completed a medical on Friday before finalising the biggest deal of the day as the summer transfer window closed.

Benfica visit Celtic on September 19 and have just tonight’s home match against Nacional to prepare themselves for life without Garcia before making the trip to Glasgow for the opening match in Group G.

In their opening matches of the season Benfica won 5-0 away to Victoria Setubal following a 2-2 home draw with Sporting Braga.

Anticipating Garcia’s move Benfica paid £10m to Atletico Madrid for midfielder Eduardo Salvio who has already scored twice this season.

Twenty-year-old Dutch striker Ola John was signed for £8m from Twente Enschede but hasn’t made an appearance this season.

Garcia spent three seasons with Benfica after failing to make the grade at Real Madrid with Benfica boss Jorge Jesus preferring to develop players that splash out on a quick fix.

He said: “When Javi Garcia arrived here he was a stranger but left as an excellent professional of quality.

“We have solutions for his position in our B team, Andre Almeida and Andrew Gomes will be the future of this club but that takes time.

“Our system doesn’t change, only the players names, we work to develop our players and they know what is expected when they replace Javi in the team.”

Benfica did complete one transfer on the final day of the window bringing Brazilian striker Lima from Sporting Braga with a new UEFA rule allowing the 29-year-old to play for Benfica in the Champions League despite playing against Udinese for Braga in the qualifiers.

CLICK HERE for Lennon on Nouioui

Follow Video Celts on Twitter and Facebook