Celtic will be without Cameron Carter-Vickers for Thursday's Europa League clash with Benfica, but manager Martin O'Neill is hopeful that Camilo Duran will be available. The Colombian forward is back home to witness the birth of his child.
Carter-Vickers out with hamstring strain
Carter-Vickers, the USA international, was absent from Sunday's 2-0 win over Motherwell at Fir Park, where Duran opened the scoring inside the first 10 minutes. The defender is still struggling with a hamstring issue.
Asked about the duo's absence from training on Wednesday, O'Neill said: "Yes, they missed it. Cameron has got a bit of a strain, hamstring strain, so he's missing."
Duran's return depends on birth
O'Neill is confident that Duran will arrive at the Estadio da Luz in time for the kick-off, but it depends on how the birth goes. "Camilo is hoping to be out here later on, his partner's having a baby, so he'd obviously want to be there at the birth. It depends on how it goes, I haven't heard any more news, but if everything goes alright without complications then he'll come round," O'Neill added.
O'Neill also revealed that Auston Trusty is available to face Benfica.
O'Neill praises Benfica boss Silva
Celtic are hoping to bounce back from their 3-1 loss to Ferencvaros on matchday one with a victory over the Lisbon giants, who claimed a 2-0 win over AC Milan at San Siro in their Euro opener.
O'Neill has been impressed by opposition boss Marco Silva. "Well he has his own style and I think that's what he would want to do with Benfica. I thought that he did very well with Fulham, in the Premier League, they're just next door almost to Chelsea, so they've always been considered as the lower team in many aspects, so what he did at Fulham was terrific, really terrific," he said. "He was at Watford, he was also at Everton as well too, so he's got a lot of admirers in the British game."
"Well they've got a lot of good players, playing for a start, but also they been given a great deal of confidence from starting off the competition, winning in Milan, that's not easy, so they have very good players, but so have we as well too, so we want to try and cause them a few problems ourselves."
