Rarely have we seen Celtic make moves for players from other Scottish clubs in recent years. Of course, there have been exceptions from time to time, but overall, the club have stuck to signing players from foreign leagues. Sometimes, they have been successful in making great additions. But most of the time, especially lately, the recruitment has raised eyebrows.
Their poor recruitment is one of the reasons why they find themselves in a title race this season against a Hearts side that has been built on a fraction of the budget. Now, it remains to be seen if Derek McInnes' team are able to keep this up over the course of a 38-game league campaign, or if they fade away just like Aberdeen last time around.
We have already seen signs of the latter, as Hearts have dropped vital points in recent weeks while Celtic have found some momentum under the management of Martin O'Neill. And if the Hoops were successful in signing one of the Edinburgh club's key players in January, it could completely derail their title push.
Football FanCast recently put out a dream XI Celtic could build should Wilfried Nancy take over as their manager. They have suggested Claudio Braga as the new striker signing in January.
Celtic tipped to sign in-form Hearts player in January
Braga has been in fantastic form at the start of the season. He has already scored 9 goals and provided 4 assists in 17 appearances. So, the Portuguese forward is one of the key reasons behind Hearts' brilliant results.
If Celtic were able to sign Braga, it would be a major blow for Hearts. That being said, it feels pretty unlikely that the Hoops would make a move for him in January. The club have been reluctant to make moves for Premiership strikers in the past, even when they are in terrific form. Bojan Miovski, back in his Aberdeen days, is a good example of this.
It is far more likely that they will try to sign a striker from a different league. They failed to bring in Kasper Dolberg late in the summer as he ended up joining Ajax. Expect the Hoops to target someone with a similar profile in January as well. Whether they will be successful in getting a deal done or not remains to be seen. Let's just hope that the new manager, if there is one in place by then, gets the proper backing.