Cameron Harper has claimed that there were cliques and a lack of togetherness in the Celtic squad that he left for New York RB last month.
The 19-year-old spent three seasons at Celtic with his only first team appearance coming against Hibs in January when 13 players had to self-isolate following the training trip to Dubai.
Lockdown, a curtailed season and his contract expiring in June 2021 all played a part in his Celtic experience turning sour but in pre-season he joined the first team in France and was on the bench for the early season matches against Dundee United and Ferencvaros.
Celtic’s next management regime have a number of issues to overcome but as Harper told American Soccer Now there seems to be a disconnect inside the club as he compared it with New York RB:
From what I’ve seen from the team so far – they are very, very good and I don’t see why we can’t go pretty far. Definitely, there’s a good spirit. I think that’s one thing at Celtic that sometimes did lack, in terms of our reserves or our first team – there were kind of cliques and there wasn’t a full togetherness.
At Red Bull, everyone wants to work hard for one another. He’s (coach Gerhard Struber) creating a real togetherness and a real spirit where, if you’re not going to give 100%, don’t even bother showing up type of thing.
Looking back at the downturn in his Celtic prospects he added
When they shipped me back down to the reserves, that’s when I got it tough because there’s only a few guys there. There are about 5-10 guys there per day and people were out on loan. I would say maybe in September, it was getting pretty bad in terms of my place there.
But I was still playing games, so it was it was OK… Leading up towards December, January, when I had a good idea about leaving, that’s when it kind of got a little bit uncomfortable.
Karamoko Dembele and Armstrong Oko-Flex are expected to leave Celtic when their contract expires at the end of the season with Adam Montgomery about the only other genuine reserve currently at the club.
Patryk Klimala has also been linked with a move to New York RB.