CELTIC are failing their young stars at the moment and they must act now to ensure this current crop of young talent don’t fade away into obscurity.

Ewan Henderson and Karamoko Dembele come straight to mind when I look at the current crop of players who are too good for developmental but can’t get a look in because of the enormity of this season.

Many Celts have been loaned out to clubs this term, however, the ilk of the loan moves can be questioned. Afolabi at Dundee, Lee O’Connor at Tranmere, Scott Robertson at Gillingham to name a few.

The current way in which we develop players is all over the place. The pandemic hasn’t helped but these young kids have had very little room to develop over the past two or three seasons. Celtic’s withdrawal from the reserve league with no plan B has been a big issue.

The reserve league had its own problems but with the lack of competitive matches for the players is a big issue.

Ideally, if you can bring these young kids through who are used to playing with one another, it will only benefit the first team. Right now, it at least appears as if Celtic send their youngsters out on loan to any club who will take them and maybe one in a dozen will end up getting a first team game.

It’s not the way to do things and it’s how we are losing young stars to the likes of Manchester City and Bayern Munich. A re-think and a new way forward is needed or we’ll see Dembele move on before we’ve even got a chance to see what he can do.

If we want to bring another Kieran Tierney, Callum McGregor and James Forrest through we need to make sure we’re giving them the best chance to succeed.

A mixture of competitive matches and the RIGHT loan move and we could be back in business.