Stephen Welsh will not be making the move from Celtic to Toulouse this summer after the Ligue 1 club ended their transfer pursuit.
The centre-back started and scored within three minutes during a 2-0 win over Aberdeen on the Premiership's opening day at Parkhead amid reports he was wanted in France. Toulouse were reported to have launched a season-long loan deal bid with an option to buy worth £3.5 million. That was swiftly rejected by Celtic and the French suitors aren't prepared to go any higher.
Sky Sports report that interest in Welsh is now at an end, despite the former Scotland youth international being their 'number one centre-back target this summer.' They will 'now move on to other targets' while Welsh looks to establish himself in boss Ange Postecoglou's defence while Swedish centre-back Carl Starfelt is out injured. The Australian was pleased with the Aberdeen win but knows improvement can be found.
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He said: “Overall, I thought it was okay. We were just a bit wasteful in front of goal and missed some opportunities that we really should have finished off.
“We’ve got goalscorers in our team from all over the park and I just thought we weren’t as decisive as we should have been.
“Stephen’s been great through pre-season and obviously with Carl being out injured and Moritz Jenz joining us late, he and Cameron Carter-Vickers have carried the load through pre-season so that’s been important for them to be playing well."
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