Stan Petrov is targeting a return to action for the Birmingham derby on January 16 at St Andrews.
The former Celt has been badly missed by Aston Villa as Gerard Houllier’s side who have won just two out of nine games since the Bulgarian picked up a knee injury at Sunderland in October.
Petrov hopes to resume full training in the next fortnight with the Birmingham fixture penciled in for his return to action.
“It has been a painful experience for me,” he admitted. “Throughout my career, I’ve never missed too many games through injury and it’s not something I’ve enjoyed.
“I just have to be patient for a little longer but my knee is now well and truly on the mend.
“I’ve really stepped up my work rate recently and I’m looking to be back in training within the next couple of weeks.
“Then I aim to be pushing for a recall within 10 days or maybe a couple of weeks of returning to training.
“With a bit of luck, I will be back for the derby away to Birmingham in mid-January.”
Saturday’s home win over West Brom was Villa’s first in a month and provided some welcome relief for Houllier.
The former Liverpool boss made some unfortunate remarks after losing 3-0 at Anfield last week which didn’t go down well with the Villa support.
Houllier’s laid back approach has been heavily criticised with reports emerging yesterday that Richard Dunne had a furious row with first team coach Gary McAllister.
Dunne was dropped from the team that beat West Brom on Saturday with Houllier expected to make major changes to the Villa squad during the January transfer window.
The hypocrisy of Motherwell’s John Boyle
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Cheap, Joe. Very cheap.
That’s just cruel Joe.
Ohhhh that is something i expect from another Celtic forum not VC’s Joe.
Apologies to anyone misled by the title.
I assumed that we all understood that the days of Premiership signings are long passed.
I keep an eye on Stan like I do our other recently departed players.
As Andy Walker, Charlie Nicholas and Frank McAvennie proved it’s never quite the same second time around.
The Championship is our scouting ground these days with Kelvin Wilson of Nottingham Forest likely to be the first signing target of the transfer window.
Sorry for anyone whose hopes were built up, and as Dougie Dougie exposed there is also no Santa Claus- honestly.