Celtic receive injury blow ahead of Livingston clash

Neil Lennon confirmed that Celtic will be without one of their star wingers against Livingston as he has not managed to recover from his injury.

Celtic will be looking to avenge their 2-0 defeat from earlier this season when they welcome Livingston to Parkhead on Saturday. And with Rangers breathing down their necks, the Hoops  cannot afford to slip up again.

Fortunately, Celtic have won all of their games since then and find themselves at the top of the Scottish Premiership table, in the final of the Scottish League Cup and in the knockout stage of the Europa League. But coming out of the international break, they must keep on building momentum as they enter a intense phase of games that will continue till the end of the year.

Neil Lennon will be hoping that lightning does not strike twice when Livingston come visiting. But there is some bad news on the injury front as Mohamed Elyounoussi has failed to recover from the foot injury that got him sent home from the Norway national team during the international break. The winger on-loan from Southampton has been a huge hit for Celtic this season and will be hard to replace.

Initially it was believed that he had picked up the injury while on international duty. But Elyounoussi has since gone on to reveal to The Scotsman that it was during the game against Hibernian in the Scottish League Cup semi-final that he got hurt. Unfortunately, the Norwegian has failed to recover from it in time to face Livingston on Saturday and will miss the upcoming Europa League clash against Rennes as well.

Speaking ahead of the Livingston clash, Neil Lennon confirmed that Elyounoussi will be out for the next 7-10 days. Celtic’s twitter account quoted him as saying:

It will be interesting to see how Celtic go about replacing the winger. Having scored 7 goals and provided 6 assists in just 12 appearances for The Hoops, he will certainly be a huge miss. One of Mikey Johnston, Lewis Morgan and Marian Shved is most likely to come into the team. Although Lennon might even opt for Jonny Hayes or a surprise comeback into the starting line up for Scott Sinclair.