Coming off a relatively poor season with Toulouse on loan during the 2016-17 season, Odsonne Edouard was always going to struggle to break through at Paris Saint-Germain, which is why he eventually ended up on loan at Celtic.
While it wasn’t a magical first season for him in Scotland, he impressed enough to convince the Premiership side to spend €10.3m on him in 2018, which he then repaid with the performances that followed.
Every week, Paris Saint-Germain’s website go and find one of their former academy products to sit down for an interview with them, with this time being Odsonne Edouard’s turn, where he recalled the behind-the-scenes events that led to him moving to Celtic.
Enjoying the experience at Toulouse, he returned to the Ligue 1 giants in hope of convincing the manager at the time, Unai Emery, but it wasn’t to be.
He said: “At that time, it was very complicated to establish myself in the PSG attack. Zlatan Ibrahimovic and then Edison Cavani piled on the goals! When I returned to the club, the manager told me that he was not counting on me because he had recruited Hatem Ben Arfa and Jesé in attack, more experienced players. So I decided to try my luck elsewhere, which is how I signed for Celtic FC.”
This loan move, followed by the subsequent permanent transfer means Edouard has never represented Paris Saint-Germain professionally, which he described as ‘more of disappointment than a regret’.
Celtic won’t care one bit, however, since they benefitted hugely from all this, as the striker quickly became a fan favourite, scoring 87 goals and assisting another 38 in 179 appearances for the Parkhead club over the span of four years.
He was then sold by Celtic to Crystal Palace in 2021 for €16.3m.
