Rodgers: Atalanta hero Ademola Lookman almost joined me at Celtic

Brendan Rodgers revealed Atalanta’s Europa League hero Ademola Lookman wanted to join him at Celtic Park during his first spell in charge.

The winger agreed personal terms on a move from Charlton but Everton outbid the Hoops in a reported £11m deal in January 2017.

Rodgers was reunited with Lookman in a loan season from RB Leipzig in 2021-22 when he was Leicester manager but again his club could not afford a permanent transfer.

He instead tipped off former Celtic chief scout Lee Congerton, who was then at Atalanta, and the English-born Nigeria international will face Celtic in the Champions League on Wednesday with his profile raised by his hat-trick heroics in last season’s Europa League final.

Rodgers said: “Ademola was one that we tracked back in my first time at Celtic.

“I met him in a hotel in London and we were looking to convince him to come. Sadly, we just couldn’t get to the levels that Charlton wanted for him, but the club had done everything they possibly could at that time.

“He wanted to join a big club and feel those pressures and everything of why a player would want to come to Celtic.

“Charlton clearly were wanting to get as much as they possibly could for him. We spoke to him from the personal perspective. It was a move that suited him and suited his representatives and he was very clear on that.

“But obviously it was the financial sum at the end, he went to Everton and it just drifted away from us.”

Rodgers added: “From that moment, we stayed in contact really. And then when I was at Leicester, we wanted to bring in another winger and we enquired about his availability when he was at Red Bull.

“He came in and he was absolutely brilliant for me, scored some outstanding goals. I remember the goal he scored against Liverpool when we won 1-0, it was a great individual goal.

“We wanted to sign him at Leicester but sadly we couldn’t sign any players that summer.

“Lee Congerton, I had worked with before, and once I told him we weren’t going to be able to sign him, Lee then took him here to Atalanta and he’s now a club legend.”

Rodgers watched Lookman’s hat-trick against Bayer Leverkusen – previously unbeaten in all competitions last season – with great pride.

“He’s an absolute top professional,” he said.

“I’m so proud of him and his career that he’s had, because he’s a young guy out of London and wasn’t scared to travel – going to Germany at the time and obviously coming up to the north-west of England to Everton.

“He leads his life in the right way, everything is geared towards being the best he could. Watching him in that Europa League final, the goals he scored – not by accident. He practised that every day of his life where he could.

“He would be out with a bag of balls, doing shooting exercises long after other ones had gone in, working on his right foot, left foot. He’s so balanced. He can shoot off his right foot the same as his left foot.

“He’s an absolutely incredible young professional. To see him score the hat-trick in the final last year was absolutely amazing.”