David Meyler is out of Ireland's crunch play-off encounters with Bosnia-Herzegovina and could miss up to two months after sustaining a knee injury in training on Wednesday.
The 26-year-old has suffered a tear to his medial ligament after colliding with Stoke defender Marc Wilson during a training session ahead of the first leg of the Euro 2016 play-off in Zenica on Friday night.
His club, Hull, posted the injury update on their official website, with their doctors predicting Meyler will be out for up to eight weeks.
Martin O'Neill was unsure of the seriousness of the injury at the time, commenting: "Sometimes when you want to be as careful as possible things like that can happen. He had to come out of things so we'll see how he is in the morning."
Meyler has scored three goals for the table-topping Tigers this season as Steve Bruce's side look to gain promotion back to the top flight at the first time of asking.
Brentford midfielder Alan Judge met up with the squad in Dublin on Wednesday evening after recovering from a hamstring problem, and could now figure more prominently in O'Neill's plans.
Meyler joins Shane Long, Shay Given, John O'Shea - who was suspended for the first leg anyway - and Kieren Westwood on the list of absentees for Ireland and O'Neill will be forced to shuffle the pack for the visit to Bosnia and return leg in Dublin next Monday night.
