Celtic have received a major boost in their signing chase of Brandon Soppy as Rennes are already planning for life without him.
The £4m rampaging right-back only made 12 appearances last season as he was the back-up to star turn Hamari Traoré last season.
And L'Equipe state now state Soppy's role as understudy will be taken up by Lorenz Assignon for the Ligue 1 side moving forward.
The 19-year-old appears a perfect fit for Ange Postecoglou 's attack-minded formation and he is understood to be available for around £4.3m with only one year remaining on his current deal.
Soppy has been capped by France up to Under-18 level and he will see Celtic have a proven track record of developing French players such as Moussa Dembele and Odsonne Edouard.
Celtic have been linked with a clutch of central defenders in Carl Starfelt, Cameron Carter-Vickers, Ben Davies and Mario Vuskovic but Soppy is very much an attacking full-back.
And he could be deployed on either side if makes the switch to Glasgow due to Postecoglou's history of deploying inverted full-backs.
The Celtic boss admits he's on the search for new players with Champions League qualifiers just around the corner.
He said: “It is not an easy process at the moment, but we are pushing hard and hopefully we will get some in the next few days.
“We need players in a number of positions, it’s not just one.
“Even looking at those who have gone from last season, purely on numbers, we need players.”
