Christian Doidge's horrific injury revealed by Hibs boss - but striker in line to face St Johnstone

Hibs are set to have Christian Doidge available on Saturday against St Johnstone despite the striker suffering a serious eye injury against Kilmarnock last weekend.

Hibs boss Nick Montgomery revealed the extent of the blow following an accident collision with Killie defender Robbie Deas that left the Welshman’s eye "virtually hanging out”.

Montgomery said: “His eye was virtually hanging out. He cut the top and bottom of his eye. To be honest, I didn’t realise at the time but it was a pretty horrific injury. Looking back at VAR, I don’t think the lad meant to do it, but it was a UFC move and his eye was completely split open. At half-time, I’ve looked at the club doctor and he just shook his head. The stitching of the two cuts took about 25 minutes, so that meant there was no way we could put him back on for the second half.

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“Doidgey is massively important for the team, he’s a real foil for the pace we’ve got out wide and he’s a real competitor in the box, you saw that in his goal against Aberdeen. It’s good to have him back. We’ve limited any contact this week to make sure his eye didn’t split open again and get infected, which is always a risk. But he’s raring to go tomorrow and I’ll make a decision whether to start him. Every day is another day for it to heal, and fortunately he’s not been head-butted this week.

“He hasn’t needed a mask. There’s no fracture but he’ll have some sort of padding. I don’t know how you cover your eye, though, unless he plays with one eye.”