In-form Celtic striker 'watched' by Sunderland and Fulham

Several top clubs in Premier League and the EFL have taken an interest in young Celtic striker Daniel Cummings, who has hit a rich vein of form for the Celts’ B team in recent weeks.

Among them are Ipswich Town, Sunderland, Burnley, Wolverhampton Wanderers and Fulham. All of these clubs have recently ‘watched’ the player and are closely monitoring his progress.

This is according to a post on X (formerly Twitter) from journalist Pete O’Rourke, who wrote: “A host of English clubs, including Wolves, Fulham, Ipswich, Sunderland and Burnley watched in-form Celtic striker Daniel Cummings scored his fifth goal in five UEFA Youth League games with the winner against Club Brugge.”

So far this season, Cummings has made 20 appearances across all competitions for Celtic B, scoring a whopping 22 goals along the way. At the age of just 18, such impressive numbers indicate that Cummings has a very fruitful future ahead of him indeed.

As things stand, Cummings has yet to make his senior team debut, though his recent form would indicate he is not too far away from a first team call up. Additionally, it is unclear how highly Celtic value the youngster - but it’s unlikely they would be willing to let him go for a paltry fee.

Hoops head coach Brendan Rodgers has a good track record of bringing academy players into the first team - perhaps his biggest success story was with Raheem Sterling at Liverpool, who has since gone on to become a four time Premier League title winner.

In a recent press conference, on Cummings and Celtic’s other academy prospects, Rodgers said: “There’s so much involved in a young player getting an opportunity to play.

“I would like to think that I’ve been a coach that all my career, I’ve put in young players. If you trace my career back as a manager, before [in] my 15 years as a youth development coach, I’ve played players at 16 years of age, 17, 18.

“It’s not just about scoring goals or performing, it’s your mentality, it’s your professionalism, it’s all these things alongside ability that is what gets you the opportunity, so that’s always something I’ll assess. I think in terms of Daniel’s output, his goals in his games, he’s done very well.

“Okay, but like I say, there’s lots of things that when I bring in a young player, I consider. Young players will always get a chance here and there’s always a number of factors why they can or can’t get a chance, but the first one’s normally ability. If they’re good enough, they’ll get a chance.

“You’ll hear all these things about Celtic and the pathway. There’s not a pathway here, so they won’t get a chance. If you’re good enough you’ll get a chance.

“Good enough in terms of your game and good enough in your attitude. If you do that, and you have a little bit of patience, you can become a Celtic player like Callum McGregor, like Kieran Tierney, like Tony Ralston, like Stephen Welsh, like Dane Murray who’s played some games. You’ll get a chance, but you’ve got to have the right traits in order to be a Celtic player.”