Brighton sign Celtic midfielder O'Riley for £25m

Matt O'Riley was born in England but is eligible to play for Denmark through his mother

Brighton have signed midfielder Matt O'Riley from Scottish champions Celtic for a fee of £25m.

The London-born Denmark international has signed a five-year contract until June 2029.

O'Riley, 23, scored 27 goals in 124 appearances for Celtic, winning six trophies including three Scottish Premiership titles.

"I'm very, very happy," he said in an interview on Brighton's website.

"It got a little bit stressful over the last couple of weeks, if I'm being honest, because I think the talks were ongoing for a good couple of months but I'm just really happy to be here now."

The deal matches the Scottish transfer record fee paid to Celtic by Al-Ittihad for Jota last summer, and Kieran Tierney's £25m switch to Arsenal in 2019.

It also represents a significant profit on the reported £1.5m Celtic signed O'Riley for from MK Dons in 2022.

On leaving Celtic, O'Riley said: "It is hard. People probably don't realise how big the club is until you get up there. It's a real family club and one that I was made to feel welcome at very early on.

"It's a very unique place just in terms of the passion the fans had, [it] is something I had never experienced before. I thoroughly enjoyed my time there.

"It is still a little bit emotional speaking about it because I had such good memories there, but it just felt like the right time for a new challenge for me."

Brighton manager Fabian Hurzeler said O'Riley's abilities as a box-to-box midfielder made him "special".

"He is a great character, and has a good ambition to succeed and that's something which is very important for us," Hurzeler added.

O'Riley becomes Brighton's seventh signing of a busy summer that includes a £40m club-record deal for French forward Georginio Rutter from Leeds and Netherlands midfielder Mats Wieffer joining from Feyenoord for about £25.5m.

Hurzeler's side are second in the Premier League after beating Everton and Manchester United in their opening two games of the season.