Last weekend, Brendan Rodgers brought Kelechi Iheanacho off the bench in Celtic’s 2-1 victory over Kilmarnock FC and the striker repaid the manager’s faith by scoring the late winner.
Iheanacho joined Celtic on a free transfer after Sevilla terminated his contract on deadline day. Earlier this month, we covered claims from Spain that he wanted to stay and was willing to take a pay cut to continue with the La Liga club.
AS provide insight into why the Andalusian club were forced to release the new Celtic signing.
He played under Brendan Rodgers at Leicester City and left them as a free agent, allowing Sevilla to sign him for free in the summer of 2024. The 28-year-old struggled to impress and was sent on loan to Middlesbrough in January.
The Nigeria international returned to Sevilla, who appointed Matías Almeyda as their new manager in June.
According to AS, Almeyda ‘trusted’ the frontman, and the latter made an effort to stay at the Spanish club by lowering his salary. The manager didn’t use him in the league this season as the player wasn’t registered with La Liga.
The planned salary reduction fit into the wage cap, but La Liga refused to accept it, citing regulations.
AS state: ‘The problem is that LaLiga doesn’t ‘believe’ that such significant salary cuts are possible.’
Had they accepted it, the newspaper say Iheanacho would have still been at Sevilla under Almeyda’s orders. The manager had faith in him and included him in his plans for this season.
Instead, Iheanacho left Sevilla to join Celtic on a free transfer and scored on his debut for the Bhoys. Brendan Rodgers and his side can now make use of Sevilla’s failure to retain him.
