Gustaf Lagerbielke’s ‘exorbitant’ Celtic wage revealed as Lecce let slip the figures behind the transfer collapse.

Since his arrival in Glasgow’s east end last summer, the Swede has yet to make an impact at Celtic Park.

Lecce manager Pantaleo Corvino has revealed Gustaf Lagerbielke’s “exorbitant” wage demands, which caused his move to Serie A to fall through.

The defender joined the Scottish Premiership from Elfsborg for around £3 million, but he has yet to convince Brendan Rodgers that he should be given a place in the team, failing to make the bench on several occasions this season. He was set to leave Parkhead on loan for the Italian side, but Celtic called off the deal due to concerns about Cameron Carter-Vickers’ injury.
Lagerbielke lashed out in the Italian press as he attempted to push through the deal, but Corvino has revealed that the club was priced out of the deal anyway, implying that the club was already satisfied with their defensive options prior to the Swede’s pleas. He stated that Lagerbielke has a deal worth €800,000 per year, or approximately £685,000.

He said: We appreciated his desire to visit Lecce. We were interested this summer, but we couldn’t meet his exorbitant demands, so he went to Celtic for 4.5 million and 800,000 euros in salary.

“We had Marin Pongracic and Federico Baschirotto.” When he wasn’t feeling right, he and his agent asked us to come to Lecce. This was his request. However, we had already identified Pongracic, Baschirotto, (Ahmed) Touba, and (Sebastian) Esposito as suitable at the beginning of January.”

in other news, Anthony Joseph discloses Stephen Welsh’s Interest for January