Has Jack Hendry been handed a chance to save his Celtic career?

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Jack Hendry has not played a single second of football since Neil Lennon took over from Brendan Rodgers at the Scottish Premiership champions.

In this strange game we call football, things can change in the blinking of an eye.

And just as Jack Hendry was packing his bags and booking a flight to Portugal, Celtic’s seldom-seen centre-back might just have been handed a golden chance to save his Parkhead career.

According to the Mirror (15 September, page 54), a defender who joined the Hoops for £1.5 million in January 2018 after a prolonged transfer saga and a series of failed bids was on his way out of Glasgow. The Portuguese transfer window doesn’t shut until September 22nd and Santa Clare, Tondela, Vitoria Guimaraes and Farenese had apparently formed an orderly queue to take Hendry on loan for the remainder of the season.

Career crossroads

Hendry has looked finished at Celtic for a while now.

A 24-year-old who shone at Dundee, catching the eye of Brendan Rodgers after an ‘excellent’ performance against Celtic in 2017, hasn’t played a single minute of first-team football since Neil Lennon replaced the now Leicester City boss in the green half of Glasgow.

And a temporary spell in Portugal reprsented more than a chance for Hendry to top up his tan. A Glasgow-born Scotland international with three caps to his name is crying out for a fresh start with Lennon obviously unconvinced by a player who Rodgers had big hopes for.

But, as we said, things change quickly.

According to the BBC, Jozo Simunovic is set for a long spell on the sidelines as he requires surgery to correct a knee problem which has kept him out of Celtic’s last four games.

That leaves Celtic with just two natural, senior centre-backs, Christopher Jullien and Kristoffer Ajer, with a gruelling Europa League campaign set to kick off this week. Hatem Abd Elhamed and Nir Bitton can play in the middle but they are far more comfortable elsewhere while youngster Lee O’Connor remains untested in the professional game.

So this feels like a crucial moment in Hendry’s career. If Lennon still decides to send him away, it is hard to see the £1.5 million man ever wearing the green and white hoops again.