Brendan Rodgers confirms Kyogo had wanted to leave Celtic | OneFootball

Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers has revealed that Kyogo Furuhashi made it clear that he wanted to leave the club. The 30-year-old travelled to France on Thursday ahead of a proposed £10m move to Rennes just hours after having three goals disallowed in Celtic’s UCL win over Young Boys.

Speaking ahead of Saturday’s game with Dundee, Rodgers revealed that the player wanted to leave and that Celtic have to respect his wishes.

Kyogo signed a new deal when Brendan arrived at the club, which was due to expire in 2027, but changed agents in the summer of 2024 to CAA Base as Manchester City were linked with him. CAA Base helped broker Ange’s move to Spurs and it appeared then that the player was considering his options. Given the volume of links, it is no surprise that a move has finally been forthcoming.

Kyogo has scored 89 goals and assisted 19 times since arriving for £4m from Vissel Kobe in the summer of 2021. In that time, Kyogo has been a huge part of the club’s success, scoring eight European goals and eight goals against Rangers as well as collecting eight trophies.

The club have taken the appropriate action in this situation but will need to move quickly to replace the Japanese striker with someone of ample quality to replace the hitman. Kyogo likely has the World Cup in his mind for next year and likely believes he needs to do something different to get a call up.

The move for Jota satisfies Celtic’s needs for quality in the wide areas but the manager is clear that he wants another striker to play alongside Adam Idah and Johnny Kenny. Daizen can play through the middle, as he does for Japan, but that may just be option for the manager moving forward.