Jozo in new injury blow

Jozo Simunovic is an injury doubt for tonight’s Europa League clash with Molde.

The defender was drafted into Ronny Deila’s defence following the defeat in Norway and impressed in the wins over Dundee United, Hearts and Aberdeen.

Simunovic’s partnership with Dedryck Boyata looked to be a key factor in bringing stability to the Celtic defence but it looks an ankle knock will rule him out of the return match with Molde.

After news of a new injury emerged Deila was asked if the defender needed to ‘man up’ with the Celtic boss replaying: “Don’t you think he wants to do that? He is desperate to play.

“He almost wanted to take an injection to play, but that is not legal. We have done it before without him. We talked about consistency but again we have good players who can do a job there as well.

“If he is 60% he will not play because that is not good enough. I know what is coming with that. I can tell you one thing, if you have a knock or a twisted ankle it is about pain, and I assure you we push every player to the full but if a player said I am 80% and I can’t sprint more than 80% then you can’t be on the plane for Celtic because I have other players who are better.

“If you are 100% but you have pain then you play with these injuries then you play. If you have a pulled muscle then I am cautious because you can re-injure it.

“It is different injuries, but knocks, twisted ankles, it is about how much pain you feel and then you have to trust people. I assure you we push every player to the limit and the players really really want to play so it is not about that but it is about doing the right thing for the right players.

“You can tell me Scott Brown is an unbelievable example, if everyone is like that then fantastic but we are different mentalities. If a player is not comfortable going on that pitch and he plays bad then we can’t say we pushed him out there and that was the right thing. You need to have trust. If I don’t trust my players, how can they trust me?”