John McGinn admits the stories about his botched transfer to Celtic in 2018 really annoy him – but hasn’t ruled out pulling on the colours of his boyhood club further down the line.
The Scotland star was reportedly on the brink of sealing a £3.5million switch to Parkhead from Hibs in the summer of 2018, only to end up joining current club Aston Villa after Celtic stalled with their offer. The 30-year-old has since gone onto establish himself as one of the top midfielders in the Premier League and helped Unai Emery’s Villa qualify for the Champions League for the first time in 42 years with a fourth place finish last season.
But appearing on the Premier Sports Scottish Football Social Club, McGinn reveals he still harbours ambitions of wearing the green-and-white one day. He said: “The stories about that whole saga have grown arms and legs over the years and it winds me up. You never say never.
“When I was young all I ever dreamed about was playing for Celtic and didn’t ever see myself playing for Aston Villa. But I have got two-and-a-half years left at Villa, whether that sees me off or if I’ve still got something left in the tank we will see. You never know.”
McGinn has also told Celtic three key men to watch out for when Brendan Rodgers’ side host Club Brugge at Parkhead on match day five of the Champions League on Wednesday night. The Villa skipper was in the Clarets team that went 1-0 down to the Belgian side in Brugge earlier this month and has given an insight into the players that impressed him the most.
“It was a tough game”, he added. “They had the left winger (Christos) Tzolis who used to be at Norwich who caused us a lot of problems. They had a striker (Ferran Jutgla) who was really old-fashioned, robust and had his shorts tucked up right to his chest. He actually looked like a juniors striker but he was one of the best players on the park.
“They were organised and we couldn’t really break them down. They let us have a lot of the ball and then they broke fast. They had a really good young right-sided Ecuadorian centre back, (Joel Ordonez) he was excellent.
“But I think at home, Celtic will be too strong for them. I watched the game against Leipzig and if they play anywhere near as good as that then I’m sure that they won’t have any issues.”
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