Brendan Rodgers expects to have three of his injured stars back in contention for Sunday’s Scottish Cup tie with St Johnstone.
The hoops were without 12 recognised first team players for last night’s 2-0 win over Hibs that maintained their six point lead at the top of the SPFL table.
Emilio Izaguirre was added to that list when he was stretchered off following a dangerous late lunge on his ankle by Darnell Johnson but after the final whistle Rodgers had some good news to report.
“Olivier Ntcham will hopefully be back towards the weekend, he has been training all week,” the Celtic boss told BT Sport. “it was brilliant to have Dedryck Boyata back, it is a plus having him back after being out so long, Odsonne Edouard will hopefully be OK by the weekend.
“James Forrest’s scan was clear, we just need to monitor the tightness of that (hamstring), whether he will definitely be available for the weekend – I would think he will definitely be ready for Valencia.”
The addition of the French duo is great news as the unrelenting February schedule continues with Celtic involved in three competitions.
After the third clash with St Johnstone in a fortnight attention turns to the Europa League when Valencia visit on Thursday ahead of a difficult SPFL clash at Kilmarnock next Sunday.
Celtic have now enjoyed six successive wins, with clean sheets, since their return from the winter break but the matches with Valencia and Kilmarnock will provide sterner tests than they have had to face so far.