Celtic are in talks to extend Ryan Christie’s contract by at least another year.
The midfielder was a slow burner after being signed from Inverness Caley Thistle in 2015. It took a loan spell at Caley Thistle and two stints at Aberdeen to develop him into a true Celtic player, famously taking his chance in the Betfred Cup semi-final against Hearts at Murrayfield after injuries to Eboue Kouassi and Olivier Ntcham.
Within a month a new contract was signed with Christie kicking on rapidly under Brendan Rodgers and Neil Lennon.
Rather than handing out ‘bumper new deals’ Celtic have tended to extend by a year at a time the contracts of Callum McGregor and James Forrest with pay hikes based on previous performances.
Getting Christie into that same bracket would be a big boost moving forward with The Sun reporting:
CELTIC have kicked off talks to keep Ryan Christie until at least 2023.
SunSport understands negotiations are on-going to extend the Hoops star’s current deal which still has two years left.
Boss Neil Lennon made clear last month his desire to reward the 25-year-old whose consistent top form last season – he bagged 20 goals for club and country – established him as one of the Parkhead club’s main men. Now, that intent has been backed up.
Christie – five years at Parkhead and with two successful loan spells at Aberdeen – is extremely happy with the champions.
And he hopes an agreement can be reached soon to give him a massive boost going into the team’s push for an historic 10th straight title
Kris Ajer and Odsonne Edouard are also under contract until 2022 but less likely to sign an extended deal than Christie.
As McGregor and Forrest have proved in the past contracts need to be an on-going issue with Scott Brown demonstrating the value of home-grown players over his 13 years with Celtic.