Dunfermline sign Tobi Oluwayemi on loan from Celtic

Tobi Oluwayemi, 21, has arrived on a season-long loan from Celtic - James McPake believes he could go on to play at the "highest level in football" - and ended the club's long wait to sign someone to compete with Deniz Mehmet.

Dunfermline have been short-handed since Max Little left at the end of last season, with no back-up on the bench during the league cup campaign, but the new goalie is settling in with a little help from his former Hoops team-mate.

The new goalie said: “Me and Ewan are very close.

"I speak to him everyday regardless and when he heard that I might be coming here he has told me what this place can do for me and what I can do for the place.

"It has helped him when he left Celtic and I felt that it is a good option.”

New goalkeeper, Tobi Oluwayemi, warming up before the match against Hamilton on Saturday. He was an unused sub. (Image: Craig Brown)

Oluwayemi went on: "He has told me about the club.

"I have played against Dunfermline before (Celtic B lost 2-1 in the Challenge Cup at East End in November 2022), I have been to the stadium and seen the fans and what it means to them.

"I think it is a big club with good things going on."

Oluwayemi, who was at Tottenham Hotspur's academy as a kid, moved north to Celtic in the summer of 2019 and has featured in Lowland League matches, SPFL Trust Trophy and UEFA Youth League competitions, while also turning out for England youth teams.

And his early chats with fellow Londoner Mehmet have uncovered a "nice topic to bond over".

He explained: "Deniz is a great guy. It has turned out that we have encountered a lot of the same people, coaches in our youth.

“When he was at Arsenal he had a goalie coach called Alex Welsh who was my first ever goalie coach.

"He is a great person and the fact that he knows him and I know him, even though we are that far apart in age, to both be coached by the same goalie coach I think is a great thing.”

Oluwayemi said he was "happy and excited" to be at Dunfermline, his third loan after spells with Cork City in Ireland and Admira Wacker in Austria.

It's a real glove affair in his family as his dad, Abiodun, was a goalie and his brother Josh also plays between the sticks, moving recently from Spurs academy to Wellington in New Zealand.

And he's been helped by two of the best in Glasgow.

He said: “Some great goalies and great people joined Celtic in the last couple of years.

"Joe Hart, Kasper Schmeichel - people who have won the Premier League and played in big international competitions.

"You learn so much from them as keepers and sportsmen.

"You ask questions as much as you can and learn as much as you can, you’d be a fool not to."

Oluwayemi said both international goalies were "magnificent with me" and left a real impression.

He added: "You start to see a trend with the top players when you speak to them.

"They all have that sense of humility and hard work ethic about them.”

On his new goalie, McPake said he had been speaking to Celtic since the end of last season but had to wait as Oluwayemi went on a pre-season tour to North America with Brendan Rodgers' squad.

The Pars boss said: "He has real potential as a goalkeeper, in my opinion, to go and play at the real highest level in football.

"That’s how highly I regard this kid."

Pars have had some fine keepers in the past.

A young Allan McGregor arrived on loan in 2005-06 and went on to star for Rangers and Scotland, Dutchman Dorus De Vries came in the following season and moved on from East End Park to play in the English Premier League and for Celtic, while Paul Gallacher and Owain Fon Williams were also capped for their countries.

McPake went on: "I have seen a lot of Tobi, spoken to a lot of people about him and now having worked with him for a couple of days you can see that he has all the attributes.

"I’m glad that we have got one in, obviously it helps with the squad but it was really important that we got one in who could push to be the number one as well."