Celtic defender Hatem Abd Elhamed overcomes injury

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Hatem Abd Elhamed’s return from injury was confirmed last night after he managed to play 90 minutes for Israel.

There were huge doubts going into the game over the fitness of Elhamed. The right-back had apparently taken ill after the 3-1 defeat to Austria. It looked almost certain he would miss last night’s clash with Latvia after Andreas Herzog’s update.

Elhamed was apparently struggling to eat with the rest of the squad, and had apparently been in his hotel room for most of the time (Daily Record).

However, he’s evidently made a miraculous recovery. Elhamed started against Latvia and managed to help his country to a 3-1 win in their European qualifier.

It doesn’t do much for their qualification hopes of course. They’re still five points behind second-placed Austria with two more games remaining. They sit in fifth place in the group, but are level on points with third-placed North Macedonia.

Neil Lennon could still play it safe on Saturday

Of course, just because Elhamed returned last night, it doesn’t mean that he’ll play on Saturday. Considering how nasty his virus sounded, Lenny could look to play Moritz Bauer this weekend.

It was actually a bit of a surprise that Herzog even threw him in regardless of how he was feeling. You would’ve thought that they would’ve been cautious and gave Elhamed a rest.

But the player clearly had no intention of dropping out of the squad. His national team have had a tough time of it of late, and had failed to win any of their previous four qualifiers before last night.

For Celtic, it’s great to see that his virus wasn’t any long-term knock. That’s the last thing we would need with such a packed winter schedule ahead of us.

It seems likely that Lenny will give Bauer another run out this weekend. After all, Celtic still have games against Lazio and Aberdeen coming up after that. You have to imagine Elhamed would be the first-choice for both.

But he’s available if Lenny needs him. Impressively playing 90 minutes last night, the big stopper showed he doesn’t have any major lasting effects from his illness.