Door opens for Barkas to leave Celtic

Vasilis Barkas could yet leave Celtic with IFK Gothenburg still in the market for a goalkeeper. 

The Greek internationalist appears to have been replaced by Tobi Oluwayemi as Celtic’s third choice keeper despite coming in from the cold to play at St Johnstone on December 26. 

With the main European transfer markets now closed there are very limited options open to the keeper if he wants to get some playing time while appearing in some matches before July might help Celtic’s hopes of bringing in some sort of transfer fee for their £5m signing. 

IFK sports director Pontus Farnerud told The Sun: 

We want to bring in a goalkeeper, and we will do that. We are close but I do not want to say who it is. 

We want a more experienced goalkeeper. We have looked at many and have been careful in the process and have high ambitions to find the right keeper with as much quality as possible. 

IFK play their first competitive match of the 2022 season on February 22 when they take on Landskrona in the Swedish Cup. 

Celtic will need to pay a big chunk of Barkas’ wages if he moves to Sweden but game time in a new environment looks like a better option than training daily at Lennoxtown with virtually no hope of playing for Celtic.