Report: Rivals' top scorer sent to injury specialist in London ahead of Sunday Celtic derby

By John McGinley

March 31, 2022

Alfredo Morelos’ participation in the upcoming derby against Celtic looks in serious doubt after he was pictured on crutches at Glasgow Airport ahead of Sunday’s match.

Football Scotland report he is on the way to see a specialist in London about a knock picked up on international duty with Colombia, describing it as a ‘devastating blow’.

Morelos has hardly been known as prolific in matches against us but he has been a massive part of Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s team over the last couple of months.

He’s been crucial to their progression to the Europa League for example, with many Rangers supporters also feeling his absence was a big miss in the 3-0 defeat to us in February. The striker has scored 19 goals in total this season – their top scorer in all competitions.

Obviously, Celtic will be entirely focused on our own game and personnel for this one. The manager and the team won’t be getting distracted by injury news across the city.

We’ve seen enough ‘miraculous’ recoveries for these matches over the years to get too upbeat about their injury problems.

However, if the Football Scotland report of visiting a specialist is accurate, then they have big issues in attack for this one.

Kemar Roofe is the likely candidate to come in and play through the middle, but he didn’t have a great game at Celtic Park last month and is lagging behind Morelos’ output this term.

Any advantage we get before Sunday is good for me, given the stakes involved.

In other news, Celtic publish class dressing room footage of Callum McGregor, Joe Hart and Ange Postecoglou.