Former Celtic player blames Brendan Rodgers for horrible experience

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·28 Maret 2025

Former Celtic player blames Brendan Rodgers for horrible experience

A major portion of Celtic's transfer strategy is trying to find hidden gems, developing them and moving them on for significantly higher transfer fees in the future. Sometimes, it works out. Like it did with Matt O'Riley, who had been playing in the English third division before arriving at Parkhead and departed two-and-a-half years later for a Scottish-record fee.

But then, there are also times when such moves don't work out. Sometimes, it quickly becomes clear that a player is not going to succeed at Celtic.

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That was the case with Kundai Benyu. He was signed in the summer of 2017 on the back of an impressive loan spell at Aldershot Town in the English National League.

Benyu made some early appearances for Celtic but then found himself completely out of the squad. In January of 2018, he was sent out on loan to Oldham Athletic. He returned the following summer, spent half-a-season at Parkhead before being spent out to Helsingborg on a temporary basis. In 2020, he found himself back in the English National League, joining Wealdstone.

Former Celtic player blames Brendan Rodgers for horrible experience

Currently, Benyu finds himself playing for Zimbabwean club CAPS United. He recently told New Zimbabwe (via Daily Record) about his spell at Celtic:

"When he (Rodgers) called me, I was happy because he is a big manager, who had managed (Philippe) Coutinho, (Raheem) Sterling and others."

But then, Benyu went on to add:

"At first, I was involved in playing games but all of a sudden I was banished from the first team."I was made to train with the reserves and (was) kicked out of the changing room as well."It was a horrible experience but I will say that it helped me to grow."For all these years, I have been asking myself the question why he did that to me."I was not given a season and I remember several times I went to his (Rodgers') office asking why I was being treated as if I was not liked in the building."I was ignored all the time I made those efforts, so in the end I accepted (it) and moved on."

It looks like Rodgers had quickly decided that Benyu was not up to the grade at Celtic. But perhaps the situation could have been handled better and made a bit easier for him.

Ultimately, it has become very clear since then that Benyu was never going to succeed at Celtic. Just look at his track record since leaving the club.

It was just a failed 'project' signing on the part of Celtic. There have been plenty more since then and there will be more in the future. That is just part of the transfer strategy.