All the signs are that Giorgos Giakoumakis may not be a Celtic player come the end of the window.
Whether the full story will ever emerge is unknown but my understanding is that his agent was exploring options regarding improving his contract but could not reach agreement with Celtic.
As SPFL joint top scorer last season, Giakoumakis is undoubtedly in a strong bargaining position and at 28 years old, who would blame him for looking out for himself and his newly grown family.
What all will have learned from this is that the manager, Ange Postecoglou, has a rigidly binary view on footballers and their futures.
Either you are all in 100% committed, or you are not. And if you are not, then it is shake hands, “all the best, mate” and off you go. It also appears there is no walking back from that.
Whether another club can meet Celtic’s demand or indeed the players by the end of the transfer window is of course to be seen.
My understanding was Celtic were looking for a third striker in this window and that new recruit Oh Hyeongyu would compliment the first choice Kyogo Furuhashi and back up Giakoumakis.
Whether Giakoumakis is sold, and the club decide Daizen Maeda and Liel Abada provide adequate striker cover is another one to be seen.
But back to Giakoumakis.
At his age he probably wants more first team starter minutes and more money given the short career.
The shame of it is that as I showed in Friday’s piece Five Sub Rule Brings Unexpected Dividends is that for certain players, even if you do not start, there is much glory to he had off the bench.
And no one is more effective than the Greek striker.

Giakoumakis averages 0.73 per 90 minutes expected goals and assists as a starter which is decent. However, as a substitute, this goes up to a whopping 2.15 xSC per 90m, an incredible return.
He really is Celtic’s Super Sub!
The term Super Sub was first coined in reference to Liverpool’s David Fairclough in a time when teams were only permitted one change per game. Fairclough was behind John Toshack, Kevin Keegan and David Johnson in a strong Liverpool side of the mid-1970s. Only 61 of his 153 Liverpool appearances were from the bench but he scored a number of important goals in that role.
It is probably not the tag a 28-year-old striker wants, but there is clearly a role here that he fills well to come on and help put games to bed or clinch tight matches at the death.
Only three of his nine goals have come as a sub but clinchers against Heart of Midlothian and in the League Cup Semi Final versus Kilmarnock were noteworthy. But as the data shows, he gets many more chances as the sub.
Whether there is a way forward whereby Giakoumakis stays the rest of this season and continues reap the sub dividend whilst Oh beds in and gets his move in the summer remains to be seen.
But given the new five sub rule, Celtic’s loss will be substantial if he moves on in the next couple of days.