Neil Lennon fears Adam Matthews could be out for three months after injuring his collarbone in the 2-0 win over Motherwell at Parkhead which took the Hoops top of the Scottish Premiership.
Goals by Anthony Stokes and Kris Commons gave the home side a comfortable win but it was marred by the injury to their wide-man who was carried off on a stretcher before the break after a hefty challenge by Well skipper Keith Lasley.
Matthews will miss Wales' World Cup qualifying double-header against Macedonia and Belgium and if the diagnosis proves Lennon correct, then he will miss the rest of Celtic's Champions League group games.
The Hoops boss said: "Our initial fears is it could be a fractured collarbone.
"If that is the case we could be looking at three months.
"We don't know yet, we haven't had any word back from the hospital yet, that's where is at the minute.
"If that is the case then it puts a big negative on what is a great day for us."
Lennon believes Celtic should have got a penalty for Lasley's challenge on Matthews, but did not blame the Fir Park captain for the injury.
The Northern Irishman said: "I thought it was a penalty. He has taken his leg first and followed through on the ball - anywhere else that is a free-kick.
"Adam did the right thing, he got his body there protecting the ball. For me it is a penalty.
"It was maybe the way he landed. It could happen anywhere.
"I don't apportion any blame to Keith Lasley for that. Tackles are made in the game, people fall over awkwardly so there is no blame attached whatsoever.
"But it was a penalty, that is my view.
"We are waiting to hear now but the physios all believe it could be a bad one."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article