Bobby Petta received his first international call-up for Holland yesterday, but the winger will have to wait a little longer for his debut after injury forced him to withdraw from the squad to play Turkey tomorrow evening.

Louis Van Gaal, the national coach, has been impressed by Petta's reversal of fortune this season, and has kept a close eye on the Celtic player's form since witnessing his outstanding performance in the 6-2 defeat of Rangers earlier in the season.

Having maintained those high standards for much of Celtic's championship campaign, Petta was finally awarded the ultimate recognition after injuries to Arnold Bruggink, the PSV Eindhoven striker, and Boudewijn Zenden, of Barcelona.

However, a groin injury which rendered him unavailable for Sunday's stalemate with Hibernian has not healed sufficiently to allow Petta to realise a boyhood dream, but the very fact that he is now being talked about in international terms says much for his metamorphosis from ridiculed fringe player under the stewardship of the man who brought him to Glasgow, John Barnes, to Celtic's new head of entertainment on the left flank under Martin O'Neill.

Petta's growing stock is further evidence of the pendulum swing between Glasgow's Big Two. Rangers' recent acquisitions from the Netherlands, Bert Konterman and Fernando Ricksen, have been omitted from Van Gaal's squad after struggling to adjust to Scottish football, while the remainder of their Dutch colony, Giovanni van Bronckhorst, Michael Mols, Arthur Numan, and Ronald De Boer have been largely unavailable with a variety of injuries.

Indeed, Mols is in Amsterdam this morning, where he will undergo yet another operation on the left knee that was so badly damaged a year ago against Bayern Munich, in the same week Henrik Larsson broke his leg on UEFA Cup duty with Celtic.

While Larsson has long since recovered, and, indeed, enjoyed arguably his most productive season with Celtic, the complexities of Mols' cruciate injury have prevented him from reaching performance equilibrium. A tidy-up operation during pre-season has failed to cure the build-up of fluid after exertion, and in a desperate attempt to finally rid himself of the problem, the 30-year-old has agreed to further surgery in his homeland.

Another Rangers striker with flawed fitness, Tore Andre Flo, has opted against representing his country in their forthcoming friendly against Northern Ireland.

The Norwegian, who has been plagued by minor ailments since his record #12m transfer from Chelsea, reported ankle inflammation after Saturday's 1-0 win at Dundee and, with an important league match at home to Hearts next weekend, he is unwilling to risk exacerbating the problem by playing in Belfast on Wednesday.

''I was planning to use Flo in the game, so it is very disappointing from that aspect,'' said Nils Johan Semb, the Norwegian national coach. ''However, we have Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and John Carew, so we should still field a strong attack in the game.''