Ange Postecoglou delivers double Celtic injury boost

Celtic continued their preseason preparations with a 3-3 draw against Rapid Vienna on Saturday. The starting line up sparked some concerns amongst the Hoops supporters though, but Ange Postecoglou has stepped in to reassure and ease those worries, in what is a massive boost for the club amid pre-season.

When the line up was announced it was seen as pretty strong and included many of the first-team regulars, who had been away longer for international matches. As is the case with early pre-season friendlies, wholesale changes were made at half time .

Osaze Urhoghide was again starting at right-back though, with a lot of fans disappointed by his performance, and there was no sign of either Anthony Ralston or Josip Juranovic in the match squad.

Rumours of injuries for the two full-backs did not take long to spread online and fans worried about those being serious, with the season not too far away. On the other hand, Juranovic has been linked with a move away from Parkhead as well, with Premier League clubs and Atletico Madrid believed to be keeping an eye on the Croatian international.

Postecoglou delivers double Celtic injury boost

Fortunately, there do not appear to be any major concerns surrounding Juranovic or Ralston though. As reported by Glasgow Times, Postecoglou said about the duo’s status while also giving credit to Urhoghide for putting in the 90 minutes:

"“Tony got a knock yesterday and just wasn’t 100 percent for today so we erred on the side of caution.“He should be fine for Wednesday.“Josip is fine, he trained fully this morning, but he missed the first part of the week so we are trying to get all the guys into a programme where they do a bit of work before we expose them to game time.“Credit to Osaze, he played 90 minutes on Wednesday and 90 minutes today. The one thing about him is he is a warrior. He works hard. We had him pencilled in for 90 minutes today, and he got through it.”"

As the match played out we saw Urhoghide be the only player to complete the full 90 minutes. He gave a whole hearted showing and certainly got stuck into it, even though it was a fairly raw performance from the youngster and it is clear that he is nowhere near being a starter for the Hoops at the moment.

It is just pre-season though and it’s also indicative of the larger and more settled squad at Celtic, that the manager doesn’t have to take as many risks this time around as he has more options available now.