JEREMY Toljan must put his wretched spell at Borussia Dortmund behind him and rediscover the form that led to him being tipped to become a full German internationalist as a youngster if he wants his Celtic loan to be a success.

But the right back possesses many attributes – including searing pace, an eye for goal and high energy levels – which can help the Parkhead club in their bids to complete a treble treble and progress in the Europa League during the second half of the season.

Those were the expert views of Stefan Buczko, who covers the Bundesliga leaders for the ESPN FC website and is the host of The Yellow Wall podcast, today after the 24-year-old agreed to move to Scotland until the end of the 2018/19 campaign.

Brendan Rodgers, the Celtic manager, had been eager to bring in a right back during January and last night he finally secured the services of Toljan with little over an hour of the transfer window to spare.

Buczko was unsurprised the defender agreed to the move as he has been a peripheral figure at the Westfalenstadion this season – he has not been involved in a single first team game under new head coach Lucien Favre - and appeared to have little chance of featuring going forward.

The former Germany Under-21 internationalist, who helped his country win the silver medal in the Olympic Games in Brazil in 2016 and the European Under-21 Championship in 2017, was signed from Hoffenheim for €6 million two years ago.

He was a regular starter for the BVB alongside the likes of Mario Gotze, Marco Reus and Andre Schurrle in his debut season and was involved in their Champions League and Europa League games.

However, the arrival of former Hertha Berlin, Borussia Moenchengladbach and Nice manager Favre has led to him dropping out of the picture at Dortmund and Buczko believes joining Celtic is the right decision.

“I’m not really sure what happened to Toljan,” said Buczko. “He just sort of fell off the radar at some point. He was bought as a stop gap player. Marcel Schmelzer and Lukasz Piszczek were their full backs and they wanted a player to cover in case of injuries.

“But Toljan never quite developed the way Dortmund had hoped that he would. They thought he would develop into a real full back talent and that hasn’t quite come to fruition.

“He’s been very average. In my opinion, he has a couple of tactical and technical deficiencies. His positioning has not always been great and his tactical awareness has not always been the best either. His first touch has also let him down at times.

“On the plus side, he is very quick, has a lot of stamina, can put in crosses and score goals. But to succeed as a full-back at the highest level, I think you have to be more comfortable controlling and passing the ball in tight spaces than he is. I think he would be an excellent choice for a wing back.

“He has never really been the first choice right back under Lucien Favre, who is currently in charge. There have been a couple of situations where he would have expected to play, but the coach opted for another player.

"He has only played in a couple of friendly matches this season. Nobody knows what kind of shape or form he is in because nobody has seen him.”

Buczko, though, can recall Toljan playing for German youth teams as well as Hoffenheim and feels the player has a great deal to offer Celtic going forward if he is deployed in the right system.

He certainly feels the Stuttgart-born footballer will have no difficulties adapting to the pressing game that has brought Rodgers so much success because he grew up playing that way.

“I can remember him playing for Hoffenheim,” said Buczko. “They have a tradition. They make their full-backs over-perform. Perhaps Toljan played for a better coach there, a manager who appreciated what his strengths and weaknesses were and utilised him in a formation that suited him.

“One thing I would say about Toljan is he presses really well. His instinct when his side lose possession is to win it back. When Dortmund give away the ball he instantly presses the ball. This is very important in the modern game.

“Jeremy played in all of the German age-group teams when he was coming through the youth ranks. The national youth sides always play a very intense pressing style. He can do that in his sleep.

“There were a lot of experts who said he was going to be a German international one day. He was never quite tipped to become the next Phillip Lahm or anything, but traditionally full back is a position where our national team isn’t the strongest and some youth coaches felt that he had a chance.

“This is definitely the right move for him. His hopes of getting into the team at Dortmund are very slim. Achrach Hakimi joined from Real Madrid in the summer. They are also looking to remodel Marius Wolf as a right back.

"Wolf joined from Eintracht Frankfurt for €5 million last summer, but hasn’t clicked. Lucien Favre tried Wolf as a right back at their winter training base and Jeremy Toljan had to cover as a centre back.”

Rodgers is looking for a long-term replacement for Mikael Lustig, the 32-year-old Swedish internationalist who is out of contract in the summer, at right back and there is a possibility that he could look to take Toljan to Parkhead permanently in the summer if the German fares well in the coming months.

Buczko feels that Dortmund will not be difficult to deal with even though they have not given the Scottish champions the option of buy him.

“Dortmund have had an excellent season,” he said. “It couldn’t have gone better. They are six points ahead of Bayern Munich at the top of the Bundesliga and last weekend they set a new club record for the number of points they had won after 19 matches.

“It has been difficult for Toljan to get into a winning team. Dortmund want to get rid of him. They are very eager to cut off dead wood. I don’t know what the motivation would be for Toljan to stay.”