Neil Lennon has touched on Kristoffer Ajer’s discomfort on his journey back from France last week, and admitted that he believes it’s simply down to fatigue.
Ajer had to come off against Lille with a groin strain early on in the second half with Celtic cruising at 2-0. The injury looked innocuous at the time, but the Norwegian international was in clear pain as he hobbled off the pitch clutching the affected area.
His departure from the play led to us seeing our lead collapse as we had to settle for a respectable 2-2 draw against the side joint-top of Ligue 1. But all eyes were focused on whether he would make the squad for today’s Scottish Cup semi-final against Aberdeen at Hampden.
Unfortunately, Lennon has all but confirmed that won’t be the case as he revealed the player’s discomfort on his journey back to Scotland from France.
As quoted by the Scottish Sun, Lennon said: “We haven’t got clarity on the extent of the injury. He’s to go for a scan so we’ll know more when we get the results back.
“I think it’s safe to say he won’t play on Sunday. He just felt something go in his groin and he couldn’t continue. He was very stiff on the plane on the way back. We won’t be able to determine how long he’s out for until we get the scan results.
“He’s been playing really well. I just think it’s a culmination of a lot of games, a bit of muscle fatigue in there.”
Ajer’s blow hopefully not a long-term one
For now, this is a set-back that we can deal with. Nir Bitton has already returned to action whilst his Israeli team-mate, Hatem Elhamed, is also set to come back into the fold.
Where this becomes a problem is if it’s a long-term injury. Having Ajer out for a prolonged period of time is more detrimental to our chances of success this season than some may believe. Given how dominant he can be at the back combined with his mazy runs from the defence, he’s a key cog in the Parkhead machinery.
Celtic have absolutely colossal matches up against Sparta Prague (x2), Motherwell (away), and Hibernian (away). Losing Ajer for each and every one of those games will lessen the quality we have on the pitch. Especially considering there remain big question marks over Shane Duffy’s ability to perform up here. Chopping and changing his partner won’t do much good.
For now, it’s still up in the air. With Ajer off to get scans, it could take several days before we find out the full extent of the injury picked up in France.
The focus now switches on to who could be his direct replacement. Elhamed has never lost a domestic game in his Celtic career, but Bitton has a ridiculously high 85% win percentage under Lennon since the manager arrived for his second spell back in February.
We believe he’ll go for the latter given he was in terrific form before he picked up Covid on international duty. With a bit of luck, all of that has now left his system and he can pick up where he left off in today’s crunch game against the Dons.
In other news, Celtic could look to replicate an unorthodox October decision for this month.
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