Auston Trusty nears Sheffield United exit after Celtic deal progresses quickly

Chris Wilder expects Auston Trusty’s Sheffield United departure to be announced “pretty quickly” after Scottish giants Celtic stepped up their interest in the American defender. Trusty cost United £5m last summer from Arsenal and moves on 12 months later for around £1m profit.

Trusty follows Anis Slimane out of the building, the Tunisian midfielder joining Norwich City on a loan deal with the option to buy, which sources in Norfolk are reporting could become an obligation upon certain conditions being met.

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“I believe Trusty's [having a] medical and final bits to Celtic,” Wilder confirmed at a press conference this afternoon. “I believe the Trusty one was last night going in this morning so that'll be announced pretty quickly.

"Anis came as an eight and a six and we said at the start of pre-season that it'd be pretty difficult with Vini, Blaster and Gus. I don't think he's a six and he's not going to play as an eight.

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"He made it clear he was going to work with an old manager who wanted to play him as an eight At 4.30pm on Tuesday night, he said he didn't want to play. He didn't want to play for my club, he didn't want to play for Sheffield United so we did our best to facilitate that.

"Auston was another one. We picked the first team of the season [at Preston] and he wasn't in it. There was interest for Celtic and he wanted to explore it.”

Asked about the plan for replacements coming into the building ahead of tonight’s 11pm transfer deadline, Wilder replied: “We've got Jack Robinson and Rhys who can play in that [left centre-half] position and if we wanted to move Anel [Ahmedhodzic] over, we could.

“Ideally we’d have a right and left footer in there but the option of Anel and three centre-halves is still there. In terms of replacements, that's the options that we have.”