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‘They don’t know half of it’ Kieran Tierney’s reply to his Celtic critics

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Kieran Tierney has told his Celtic critics that they don’t know the half of it over his transfer to Arsenal last summer.

The defender was the original ‘one of our own’ who came through the ranks to live the dream, playing for the hoops while remaining very much connected to the support that he had emerged from.

When he was out injured he’d go along to support the team with his mates but last summer his reputation took a pounding as some misguided fans accused him of betraying the club.

After discovering that the soothing promises of Brendan Rodgers were worthless sound-bites the exit of Tierney angered many fans but a significant number could see that the £25m sale had been engineered by the Celtic board.

Tierney had been badly troubled by injury during the 2018/19 season with his mobility not all that it had been as he dragged himself from the treatment table onto the pitch as the only genuine left-back in the squad.

His transfer saga dragged on for almost a month, at no point did Peter Lawwell say that the player wasn’t for sale with a £25m bid accepted from Arsenal just before the EPL transfer window closed.

Shortly before the Tierney deal Arsenal paid St Etienne £27m for William Saliba with the teenager staying in France for a further year before moving to London.

Me and Tom Rogic were injured and he was asking if it was happening and I said ‘don’t think so mate’.

And honestly I was looking at flats round about my area because I was thinking about moving out and I’d went with my mum and my mate to go see this place and that place. This was the day before, a couple of days before.

And I told everybody ‘this is off, it’s not happening.’ Then I got the call to say ‘Celtic have said you can go, they’ve got what they want for you. And that’s when I was down at the park. It was mental, it’s a blur.

I was on the flight near enough greeting to my agent like ‘what’s happening here? I’m getting it stinking. This is going to be my family’s life forever, me known as what these people are making me out to be.

They don’t know half of it, they just assume everything and they don’t know.

After being given time to overcome his injury problems Tierney became a real folk hero at Arsenal, helping the club win the FA Cup Final with a 2-1 victory over Chelsea at Hampden.

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