Scouting for Celtic - Centre Forwards

If Paul Tisdale is the football doctor... then doctor's orders certainly are a number nine

Celtic’s current selection of forwards is probably the worst I have seen in my lifetime (I’m too young for Tony Cascarino or Wayne Biggins so don’t come at me with them), and it is torture to watch Johnny Kenny up front right now. It’s nothing against Johnny Kenny, I honestly feel a little sorry for him because he’s taking all of the heat and as a young player that must be really tough. Years of lacklustre recruitment have led to this point, where a young player who clearly isn’t good enough has been thrust into a situation uncomfortable for everyone involved.

I’m not a great fan of these threads you get on Twitter where people list all these amazing players whom Celtic should sign, because it gets your hopes up that we might actually make some good decisions – and then, inevitably we end up with an absolute carthorse journeyman on a free transfer or a loan from an English club with about four minutes left of the transfer window.

However, for me it is an interesting exercise to pour through the data and see what players stand out. In the summer, a few of the players I really liked have done well this season – one in particular (Franculino) put us to the sword when we played Midtjylland. So, if you are masochistically inclined to get your hopes up in spite of how Celtic treat you, this article will detail a few forwards who – based on the data and my interpretation of it – could be suitable for Celtic in a variety of different ways.

All this data was collected on 24/12/2025, the minimum number of minutes required was 1013, and the age range I chose was from 18-27.

My Undisputed No.1 Target – Tomas Bobcek

Tomas Bobcek is 24 years old, 6 ‘ 1” tall currently playing for Lechia Gdansk in Poland, where this season he has scored 13 goals in 17 appearances – a goal every 101 minutes. He stands out massively in this dataset of over 200 players, being in the 99^th percentile for goals per 90 and shots taken, 97^th for xG per 90, 94^th for touches inside the box, 88^th for shots on target %, 81^st for dribble success % - basically, he’s on absolute fire. He may also have some creative value, being in the 74^th percentile for xA per 90. He shows up as potentially a complete forward, a profile that would be a massive help in the way we are trying to play under Wilfried Nancy.

Lechia Gdansk signed him for around half a million Euros in 2023, but with his form this season and given he has recently made his international debut for Slovakia, I would estimate Celtic would need to pay somewhere between £3million – £7million to get him in January. It’s more of a premium than I’m sure the Celtic hierarchy would be comfortable spending and we’d need to hope Dermot Desmond is checking his emails, but I feel he could instantly solve our issues at centre forward.

Experience, and a funny name – Jizz Hornkamp

Aside from the fact that having a striker named Jizz would be funny in a very juvenile way, Hornkamp has a bit more experience than the other strikers we are looking at. 27 years old and spending his entire career in the Netherlands, he has mostly scored goals at 2^nd division level but this season has managed to translate that to top flight football for Heracles with 10 goals in 13 appearances, averaging a goal every 117 minutes. 98^th percentile for goals per 90, 90^th percentile for xG per 90, 95^th percentile for shots on target % – but his aerial ability is probably his super strength, being in the 97^th percentile for success rate in aerial duels. 84^th percentile for dribbling success rate also suggests a decent propensity to keep control of the ball when travelling with it.

Hornkamp isn’t perfect but I have no doubt he would be a better option than what we are currently working with. Don’t forget that realistically, we probably need two strikers given that of our current options; one is 33 years old and never fit, one has been overlooked by now three managers, and the other is – well, not very good at scoring goals. Hornkamp has been doing good work, scoring goals at a good rate for three different clubs now and could be a very decent option. A few different places have his market value between £1 million - £1.5 million, but he may well be worth more than that to Heracles who find themselves in a relegation battle.

A youthful approach – Adrian Svanback

Svanback is a Finnish forward, only 21 years of age and currently playing for Hacken in Sweden. He signed for Hacken only in the summer of 2025 after breaking through at Helsingborg. He is a little different as despite featuring mostly as a CF, he also has some minutes playing out on the right. This may explain why his scoring prowess is not as outstanding as the other players we are looking at, but it is in the other areas of his game I think he could have real value.

72^nd percentile for goals per 90 isn’t outrageously good, but 99^th percentile for xG per 90 certainly is and evidences that he knows how to get himself into great shooting positions. 90^th percentile for aerial duel success rate indicates someone who is aerially dominant – and 93^rd percentile and 72^nd percentile for touches in the box per 90 and deep completions per 90 respectively suggests he can get himself in the box but also find other players in the box.

He is really well rounded for a young player, and offers a different proposition – someone who can be a focal point upfront and get into good positions, but who can also combine well with other players. Watching footage of him, he looks very good technically and has an athletic build, 5’ 10” yet still superb in the air.

This is the one that I think would be our best option if we want a talented young player with potential who can supplement a more experienced goalscorer like a Hornkamp or Bobcek. Having someone who can contribute at CF and perhaps off the right wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing either. As far as transfer fees go, £872k - £1 million is what is estimated; but given his age, performances, and relatively short time at the club, I would imagine it would take a little more than that to pry him from Sweden.

Honourable Mentions

I was going to have Daniel Karlsbakk as a fourth option here but then I saw that 7 of his 18 goals in Norway last season were penalties and it put me off a little. He still looks like a talented striker, very tall and the non-penalty goals included some really nice finishes.

I also liked the look of Jay Enem at OFK Beograd in Serbia, but upon watching some footage he looked a little… cumbersome with the ball. Supposedly has a move to Red Star in the offing and I can see why, scores goals and has a very athletic build.

Kasper Waarts Hogh is one of the best strikers in this dataset but the Bodo/Glimt tax gives me the fear, a lot of players who leave that club are never really able to recapture the form they showed under Knutsen. They are not beating the secret Arctic doping lab allegations…

And lastly, I really, really liked the look of Jovan Milosevic at Partizan Belgrade – but he is on loan there from Stuttgart and has been really good for them this season, so to my mind that would be a really difficult deal to pull off but we can live in hope.

There were many talented forwards that I looked at that haven’t been mentioned, but these were the pick of the bunch for me. We will no doubt be linked with many more, Louis Munteanu and Diego Rossi have been named in the media recently but the Romanian League and MLS I did not include in this dataset.

As a caveat, I am not by any means a guru of scouting or talent ID. I just find that the use of data can be really revealing when used correctly (which I try my best to do). It’s entirely possible that we could sign any of the players I’ve mentioned and they turn out to be cack. But I’d quicker hang my hat on data over a large enough sample size than on a four minute long YouTube compilation, baiting engagement with “*insert player* Welcome to Celtic???”.

If there is any semi-decent links in the coming weeks then I will attempt to profile them accordingly on Twitter, if you are interested in this sort of stuff then please feel free to give me a follow on @databhoys. I really hate that Twitter handle, every time I post a somewhat disagreeable take I get someone slagging it… but it’s stuck now so I may as well just deal with it. I’ll probably change it. Maybe.

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed!

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