Neil Lennon has revealed that Hatem Abd Elhamed has suffered a hairline fracture of the leg.
The defender has missed Celtic’s last three matches and seems certain to sit out Sunday’s visit to Ibrox.
Elhamed seemed to be settling into the right-back role vacated by Mikael Lustig but with Kris Ajer also a major injury doubt that position is causing a headache for Sunday’s derby clash.
After the 4-1 win over AIK Lennon told The Sun:
Hatem, we’ll have to assess him, but he’s been very sore with a slight hairline fracture. I think it’s just a slight fracture in a bone at the side. Now, you can play with it but there’s a lot of discomfort and he’s just going through that at the minute. We have to assess him but sometimes it can take a couple of weeks to recover from something like that.
Of the three summer signings at the time Elhamed was the only one to start in the Celtic side for the Champions League second leg qualifier against Cluj.
The hairline fracture happened during the Betfred Cup tie against Dunfermline or in training leading up to the first leg against AIK.
On Wednesday Celtic did sign Moritz Bauer on loan from Stoke but it would be asking a lot to pitch the 27-year-old right-back into his first game of the season at Ibrox on Sunday.
The other options open to Lennon are to play Tony Ralston or switch to a back three although there is no word over whether Jozo Simunovic will be fit to join Christopher Jullien and Nir Bitton in defence.
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— Joe McHugh (@videocelts) August 29, 2019