Arne Engels: Why did Celtic reject a £25m bid from Nottingham Forest?

O’Neill spent a lot of time answering questions about when reinforcements would arrive, and joked that he could see the faces of journalists while he slept as they repeated familiar questions.

The manager was more direct when asked about the board’s decision to reject Engels’ offer.

“Here, this is an enormous amount of money,” he said. “I’m personally glad the board rejected it.

“It’s really tempting, and it came at a very late stage, I have to admit, so a huge credit to them for that.

“Arnie didn’t make a fuss about it either.

“We can look at things again in the summer but obviously that was an important statement.”

Selling Ingles without bringing in a replacement would have left O’Neill short of midfield options as he attempts to take the fight to league leaders Hearts and resurgent Rangers. It is no stretch of the imagination to imagine that he would have made his feelings so clear to the Celtic hierarchy when told of Forrest’s interest.

Club captain Callum McGregor remains an outstanding player and leader in midfield, while summer signing Benjamin Nygren has contributed goals and creativity. But Rio Hattat has been nowhere near his best active form this season, and Paulo Bernardo has now been at Celtic for two-and-a-half years and does not look close to establishing himself as a regular starter.

The cover simply wasn’t there to allow Engels to move as Celtic battle for the Premier League trophy, compete for the Scottish Cup and look to overtake Stuttgart in the Europa League.

O’Neill is happy and it remains to be seen whether this incident will affect Ingles, who has a calm and collected personality on and off the field.

However, supporters seemed divided on whether the decision was a job well done or a missed opportunity.