Martin O’Neill was absent from Celtic’s press conference on Wednesday due to a ‘personal matter’.

Instead, assistant boss Shaun Maloney stepped in to face the media ahead of his side’s home Europa League clash with Celta Vigo on Thursday evening.

No further details have been given on the Celtic boss as of yet, including whether or not he will return to duties for Thursday’s game.

Speaking ahead of the game, Maloney gave an update on the condition of Celtic’s squad, including that of Alistair Johnston, Auston Trusty and Cameron Carter-Vickers.

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Shaun Maloney gives Celtic squad update: ‘Both won’t make tomorrow’

On Carter-Vickers and Johnston, Maloney said: “Those two guys… Alistair’s been back training a little bit longer, Cameron just started this week, but both won’t make tomorrow. But they should, if it goes well for the next couple of days, be available for the squad on Sunday.”

He continued on Trusty and the rest of the squad: “Auston’s sort of got a private matter, so he won’t make tomorrow. Sorensen is pretty similar, actually, but he’s back in the country today, so he’ll be in the squad tomorrow.”

On Thursday’s clash and building from the huge win over Hearts at the weekend, he continued: “It massively helps. When you have that sort of result, it brings confidence to the players. Some individuals, and obviously the team.

“I’d say the week coming back that we’ve had has been pretty positive. It was a really difficult game in Benfica, but the second half sort of led into the Hearts game.

“It was a really difficult 30 minutes, but what the guys showed in trying to go toe-to-toe with Benfica in that second half sort of led us into the game against Hearts. Probably even further back with the Motherwell performance as well, so it’s okay at the minute.

“Tactically, it’s going to be a very different game [on Thursday]. It sounds really simple, but some of the basics that we did — we had to outrun Hearts in certain areas that we did, 50-50s came out on our side in that game — there’s some fundamental things about a game of football that we got right in that game.”

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