Celtic defender Adam Matthews will join Sunderland over the next 48 hours.

The right-back should complete the move, which is expected to cost the English Premier League club about £2million, over the next few days after holding talks with the Wearsiders this week.

Queens Park Rangers were also interested, however, Sunderland manager Dick Advocaat has all summer targeted the player and after an earlier bid was rejected by Celtic, he has almost doubled his offer to secure someone he rates highly.

Matthews, 23, has a year left on his current deal at Parkhead and given the new arrival of Saidy Janko this week, it became clear that either the Welshman or Mikael Lustig would move on to accommodate the Swiss former Manchester United player.

Since his 2011 move from Cardiff City, Matthew has played 148 times for Celtic, including many of the club’s biggest games in recent years, and established himself as favourite among the supporters.

He won everything in the Scottish game and was also a solid performer in the Champions League.

The Welsh international made 42 appearances last season and is one of the few Celtic players remaining at the club who were part of the team which beat Barcelona 2-1 in the Champions League.

Matthews will be recalled more than fondly by Celtic supporters as he rarely let them down over his three years at the club.

Swedish international Lustig may have suffered from dreadful injury last season, but he has always been a favourite of Ronny Deila, so when Janko came in it was perhaps obvious that the Welshman who would have been the one ushered out of the door.