Injury mystery for Joel van den Berg

Joel van den Berg has been pictured outside Celtic Park with a protective boot on his left foot.

The midfielder joined Celtic on the UEFA signing Deadline Day but has yet to play a minute of football for his new club.

Van den Berg was named as a substitute for the matches away to St Mirren and St Johnstone but was absent from both Glasgow Derbies. He was also left out of Celtic’s Europa League squad.

As the only permanent signing made following Celtic’s Champions League exit fans have been puzzled by the complete lack of playing time given to the Dutch midfielder.

One picture yesterday provided a little detail on van den Berg’s lack of Celtic activity.

Typically Celtic haven’t provided any details on van den Berg’s injury.

Nor has any reporter asked Martin O’Neill about his £3.5m signing.

When the signing was announced O’Neill told the Celtic website:

We are really pleased to bring Joel to the club.

He is a hungry young player with real talent and technical ability and I believe he has a very exciting future ahead of him.  

I think he is a player that our fans will enjoy watching and I know he will be an important addition to our squad.

WHERE WILL VAN DEN BERG FIT IN AT CELTIC?

Once fit the next question is where and when van den Berg fits in to a Celtic midfield that clearly doesn’t function as a unit.

Martin O’Neill has stuck largely with Callum McGregor, Mika Baur and Ben Nygren with Baur effectively replacing Arne Engels in the side.

Clearly there is very little in common between Engels and Baur which goes some way to assessing Celtic’s midfield problems.

Transfermarkt describes van den Berg as a central midfielder but how that transfers from Holland to Scotland remains to be seen.

Right now nothing is predictable at Celtic, if O’Neill is in charge for the match at Motherwell on October 11 most fans will be surprised.

The possible interim appointment of Shaun Maloney inspires no confidence. At Hibs and Wigan he has achieved nothing of note.

A change of manager will almost certainly create fresh opportunities, it would be strange if a new set of eyes viewed things similar to O’Neill and Maloney.

Van den Berg could be part of the solution but needs to find match sharpness.

It seems that Lennoxtown will be closed for training this week with non-international players returning next Monday.

O’Neill isn’t expecting his international players back until October 8. It could be said that the international players aren’t expecting to see O’Neill again.