Celtic‘s lengthy pursuit of Adam Idah this summer underscored a couple of salient points.
With the club eventually forced to cough up an initial fee of £8.5million for the striker — a number which could rise by a further million — the advantage of having a pre-agreed figure in a ‘loan with an option to buy’ arrangement is plain to see.
Unlike the deals which saw Jota and Cameron Carter-Vickers arrive initially on loan with £6m purchase fees already nailed down, Idah arrived in Glasgow in January purely for a five-month stint.
Given Celtic’s preference for the kind of arrangements involving the Portuguese winger and American defender, it can be safely assumed that the absence of a fixed fee in Idah’s case was at Norwich City’s insistence.
The upshot of which was the Carrow Road hierarchy holding the whip hand in negotiations that have taken an age to conclude.
With Celtic having an opening offer of £4m rejected, talks ran into the start of the season and Brendan Rodgers made do without the Irishman for the opening two league matches.
Adam Idah’s profile has changed dramatically from the striker no one wanted back in January
The striker will forever retain a place in Celtic hearts after scoring a Scottish Cup final winner
Idah is a big hit with the rest of the Celtic dressing room, who appreciate his ability up front
The final fee is just short of the record £9m Celtic paid to Paris Saint-Germain for Odsonne Edouard in 2018 and could yet exceed that. By any stretch of the imagination, it’s a huge investment.
More pertinently, Idah’s story also demonstrates the folly in judging any player before they’ve had a fair crack of the whip.
The response to news of his initial loan move among Celtic fans back in January was lukewarm. It was hardly Idah’s fault that he was one of just two arrivals that month, together with Nicolas Kuhn.
He was immediately classed as a panic signing who’d been foisted upon Rodgers. This was untrue on both counts.
The Celtic manager could hardly have been more enthused about the chance to work with the player.
‘If I can unlock the talent that he has, then this boy is a top-level striker,’ said the Northern Irishman at the time.
‘He’s not just a boy where, even if you max out everything, he can only get to a certain level.
Idhah celebrates last season’s Scottish Cup glory with Oh Hyeon-gyu and Kyogo Furushashi
‘This is everything. This is 6ft 2in, power, speed. So, once he finds the relationships with the other players and the runs — and we’ll play to his strengths because he wants to run in behind — then he’s going to be a real handful.’
The prediction was certainly borne out. Of the 19 appearances Idah made in a Celtic shirt, just seven were starts. Yet he still managed to score nine goals.
For what it’s worth, Edouard hit the net 11 times in 26 appearances in season 2017-18 prior to his deal being made permanent, an inferior percentage return.
It wasn’t just the volume of goals from Idah that served up a large helping of humble pie for the cynics, though.
They came in big moments — braces at Easter Road and Fir Park to keep his team in the title race. One at Ibrox in a pulsating 3-3 draw. The last-minute winner against Rangers in the Scottish Cup final.
Despite being behind Kyogo Furuhashi in the pecking order, Idah’s contribution was decisive.
Offering a sharp contrast in style from the Japanese, his physicality posed further difficulties for defenders already weary from trying to track Furuhashi’s stealth-like movements in the final third.
Idah’s goals against Hibs at Easter Road proved to be huge moments in last season’s title race
The pair were also used as a partnership on five occasions, although they replaced each other in Idah’s last dozen matches.
Explaining the differing threats each posed from the perspective of a defender, Liam Scales explained: ‘Adam is obviously very different to Kyogo. Kyogo is a brilliant, amazing player, but Adam has more physicality.
‘Kyogo is better at playing off people’s shoulders and he scores loads of goals doing that. But Adam gives you that different option.
‘If you hit his feet, he can hold up the big Scottish defenders that he is playing against.
‘Our centre-backs or midfielders can play it to him. He has creative players playing off him as well.
‘That is a strength that he brings, apart from the goals that he scores. He was coming on in a lot of games after Kyogo had run the centre-backs ragged.’
Rodgers didn’t push the boat out to sign Idah just because he was a popular figure in the dressing room but, by all accounts, he did slot in seamlessly.
He seemed to embrace the glare of the spotlight that fell upon him the minute he swapped Norfolk for Glasgow.
On a brief trip back to Cork after joining Celtic, he was mobbed by fans in his local pub. This, he explained, had never happened to him in his time as a Norwich player.
It was undoubtedly one of the draws of making the switch permanent. Whatever the limitations of the Scottish game, Celtic still have huge global appeal. And once a player has sampled it, it’s hard to live without.
Idah celebrates with Luis Palma, Anthony Ralston and Callum McGregor after the win at Hibs
Even in the minutes that followed his winning goal in the cup final, Idah was publicly diplomatic about his chances of returning.
It was a different story behind the scenes. Upon returning to Norwich, he left the hierarchy in no doubt that he had his heart set on signing for Celtic.
With Johannes Thorup taking over from David Wagner at Carrow Road this summer, there were a lot of moving parts to contend with. The incoming Danish manager made it clear that he wanted to look closely at every player before deciding if they had a future under him.
Things got messy when Celtic couldn’t strike an agreement and Idah went AWOL when he should have been on a flight for a pre-season game against Hoffenheim.
He found himself subjected to disciplinary action but returned to the fold as a substitute as Norwich lost to Oxford in their opening Championship match last Saturday.
Still capable of pulling crowds of over 25,000 in the English second tier, Norwich are clearly a big club in their own right.
But it’s hard to believe that they will ever be able to dangle the carrot of playing in the Champions League. Celtic are guaranteed eight matches in the revamped competition between now and February.
And, without question, that is where every footballer wants to test themselves.
‘Adam is not going to be playing against better teams and better players every week if he moves back to Celtic permanently,’ reasoned former Republic of Ireland midfielder Ray Houghton.
‘But he will be in the Champions League — and that is not an experience he has had before.
‘It would do him the world of good as a person and a player to gain that experience.
‘For him, personally, it would be a good challenge.’
More immediately, seven months after his loan signing was met with a collective shrug of the shoulders, Idah will be given the welcome of a returning hero if he steps out against Hibernian in the second round of the League Cup on Sunday.
Who would have believed that the man so few supporters wanted in January could become the one they desired above all others this summer?