Liel Abada is a Southampton target but Celtic don’t want to sell. What kind of offer do you think could tempt the Hoops?
MICHAEL GANNON: There’s no need to sell Abada right now but when the time comes he could make Celtic a huge stack of dosh. At 21 and with proven end product, there’s no reason he couldn’t command £20m plus when the time comes.
DAVID McCARTHY: Celtic have him on a deal until 2026, so hold all the aces here. The youngster has been superb for them and they’d surely be looking somewhere north of £15m for him.
FRASER WILSON: If Celtic are serious about keeping the Israeli then it would take something pretty ridiculous to change their mind. Upwards of £12m.
Jon McLaughlin returned for Rangers last night in place of sickness-hit Allan McGregor - what do you make of the situation between the sticks at Ibrox?
MICHAEL: Rangers need a new goalkeeper. McGregor has been great servant but time has caught up and it’s starting to cost the side goals.
DAVID: McGregor is the best he’s got and he’s still very good but this will surely be his last season. Jon McLaughlin and Robby McCrorie are solid goalkeepers but Rangers need better than ‘solid’ so I’d expect a new No 1 next term.
FRASER: I said in the summer McGregor’s time - superb as it has been - was up and I've not changed my mind. The saves are becoming few and far between just like the clean sheets. Jon McLaughlin is an all round better goalkeeper right now but the real travesty is how Robby McCrorie has dropped right out of the equation at a crucial age in his career.
Aberdeen have had a torturous week losing to both sides of the Old Firm at the death but how much were Jim Goodwin’s tactics to blame?
MICHAEL: Not at all. Goodwin were three minutes away from a draw with Celtic and was seconds away from beating Rangers. If his players had kept the head they could have had four points and he’d be getting hailed as a genius.
DAVID: Against Celtic, it was 100 percent on Goodwin for setting up so defensively. But against Rangers, that was down to the players’ mentality. They wilted and there was nothing the manager could do from the sidelines.
FRASER: Results drive the narrative so it was no surprise to see the criticism that followed the ultra defensive display against Celtic despite being so close to gaining a point. But the Dons were superb for an hour against Rangers and deservedly led only for the game management of players making the wrong decisions and bad errors in the closing stages to cost them.
In the spirit of Christmas if you had one gift to unwrap for Scottish football what would it be?
MICHAEL: A fast forward button for VAR.
DAVID: That Lionel Messi has a secret 16-year-old Scottish love-child cutting about Drumchapel, who has inherited all of his dad’s footballing genius and at 16, is about to pledge his allegiance to the country of his birth. We can but dream!
FRASER: For the handball rule to be black and white. Deliberate handball - foul. Everything else - no foul. Then the weekly arguments would soon go away, right? Ho, ho, ho .. nae chance.
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