“Alistair has had a wee bit of a setback,” Martin O’Neill

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·04 de abril de 2026

“Alistair has had a wee bit of a setback,” Martin O’Neill

Martin O’Neill remains optimistic that Celtic supporters will see Alistair Johnston back in action for club and country over the next month so after the Canadian international defender suffered an injury setback on the final day of training with his national squad…

“Alistair has had a wee bit of a setback,” O’Neill explained yesterday afternoon. “He went away with the Canadian national side, was doing some running and had a bit of a setback on his final day of training, which was really disconcerting for us.

“In the wider scheme of things, for the length of time he’s been out, hopefully it’s not too bad. But it has delayed things a little bit here. We were hoping to have him, I’m not saying for this weekend, but we were hoping to have him in a couple of weeks, maybe having played some bounce games. That will just have to be parked and put to the side for the moment. It’s a shame,” the interim Celtic manager said via TSN.

Vídeos OneFootball

Alistair Johnston of Celtic celebrates scoring his team’s second goal during the Premier Sports League Cup match between Celtic and Falkirk at Celtic Park on August 15, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

“He went with the national side and was only ever going to do little bits of training, which is all he did. If we’d had a full quota of players here, then he’d have stayed with us. We felt there might be a benefit of being away with the national side, just in a different environment, as he hadn’t met up with them for some time.

“Obviously, they’ve got the World Cup, and he’s a big player for them. So, we all felt it was the best idea. It was only on the final day that he felt a bit of a niggle.”

Martin O’Neill also recognises the importance of getting back to fitness for the player himself with a view to participating in a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity to play for Canada in the World Cup Finals on home soil this summer. And as such O’Neill is prepared to predict that Johnston will indeed wear the Hoops again in this campaign.

“Don’t hold me to this, but there must be a fairly good chance that he [will play here before the end [of the season]. He was on course, hoping that having come back from Canada, that we would have been able to have done something with him this week in terms of a bounce game. That’s been put on hold so I couldn’t tell you but again I don’t think he’s far away.”

Colby Donovan injured at Tannadice. Dundee Utd v Celtic. Sunday 22 March 2026. Photograph by Vagelis Georgariou

Celtic head back to the City of Discover tomorrow having collected zero points from nine is this most frustrating of campaigns. It’s back to Dens Park this time and with Julian Araujo also missing the right-back choices are Colby Donovan who has recovered from his Tannadice knock and Anthony Ralston, who got some minutes for Scotland in the friendly against Japan at Hampden last weekend.

Anthony Ralston of Celtic arrives at Fir Park ahead of the Premier League match between Motherwell and Celtic at Fir Park on December, 2025 (Photo by WM Sport Media/Getty Images)

Donovan looked a little flustered in the game at Tannadice with O’Neill telling him to calm down from the sidelines. It may well be that Ralston’s experience as a multiple title winner will be the deciding factor for tomorrow’s team selection.

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