Stephen Robinson believes that Dylan Reid is in the best environment to develop his professional career.
Celtic have apparently had a bid of £125,000 by the St Mirren board with talks underway with the teenager.
Moving to Celtic would give Reid a significant pay rise but almost certainly Lowland League football while St Mirren can offer a clearer pathway to top team football in the SPFL Premiership.
As Motherwell boss Robinson steered David Turnbull from prospect into a £3m record transfer fee and is hoping that example can convince Reid to remain in Paisley.
Picking up on an interview with Sky Sports, the Daily Record reports the St Mirren boss saying:
Obviously we’re a club that has to develop players and has to sell players. We believe Dylan is a highly-rated young talent that we can develop here.
We have an academy system that produces players, there’s no fewer than six young players training with us currently.
Kieran Offord may start the game on Saturday (against Cowdenbeath), he’s been brilliant and there are other young kids in and around that.
For me it’s a very good club for young players to develop. Dylan, his advisors and his family have decisions to make. He doesn’t need to look too much further than here to develop.
One obvious compromise would be for Celtic to sign Reid and loan him back to St Mirren, in January 2018 a similar deal was agreed for Lewis Morgan.
An obvious attraction of moving to Celtic would be six matches in the UEFA Youth League with those fixtures matching the top team fixtures.
