Sead Hakšabanović spent two years at Celtic before leaving Brendan Rodgers’ side permanently for Malmö FF last summer.
The winger joined Celtic from Rubin Kazan in 2022 when Ange Postecoglou was in charge in Glasgow. Brendan Rodgers returned to the club in June 2023 and didn’t favour the 25-year-old, resulting in a loan move to Stoke City that summer.
Hakšabanović clocked in over 1,000 minutes from 21 matches for Stoke City and returned to Celtic at the end of last season. The Scottish Premiership champions cut ties with his permanently when they sold him to the Swedish club in June 2024.
According to Sportbladet, the former Celtic man has struggled since arriving at Malmö as has been limited to 26 minutes of action from three games.
The Montenegro international picked up a groin injury in August and was forced to spend over four months on the sidelines. He’s already recovered from the groin problem but isn’t in contention to face Czech side AC Sparta Praha in a friendly later today.
Hakšabanović has told Sportbladet that he struggled with an illness in recent weeks but doesn’t seem to be fit enough to return to the pitch.
“I could have been available for Friday’s match, but I have been sick for three weeks,” he said.
“I had a virus – mycoplasma. Never been as sick before as I was then. It got to the point that I couldn’t sleep at night because I was coughing so much.”
Hakšabanović has had multiple setbacks since Celtic and is determined to fight back.
“No, that’s life. You get up and drive again. I have so much motivation and so much love for football. There is nothing that makes me break,” Hakšabanović explained.
“The [groin] operation did the trick and now we are back. I had two holes. The doctor thought that was a little unusual. Because I trained so hard before the break, I still feel in pretty good shape. Then it’s obviously a small setback but give me a fortnight and a half and I’ll be back on track.”
