Republic of Ireland goalkeeper Shay Given is set to miss his country's Euro 2016 play-off tie against Bosnia and Herzegovina due to a knee injury.
The 39-year-old was absent from Stoke City's matchday squad for Saturday's 0-0 draw at Newcastle United after aggravating a problem with a piece of floating bone in his knee during training.
Stoke manager Mark Hughes expects Given to undergo surgery to address the issue and said he would be "surprised" to see his player feature in next month's double header for the national team.
"It was in training the other day. Unfortunately after training his knee blew up," Hughes said.
"He's got a little piece of loose bone in the knee, which we hoped would just settle down.
"Obviously it's raised its head against and it looks like he might have to have a procedure to deal with it.
"I'm not sure if that decision [on whether to operate] has been made as yet but it's probably what will happen.
"He won't be available for that [the Euro 2016 play-offs] – I would be very surprised."
Given has been capped 133 times for the Republic and re-established himself as first-choice goalkeeper during the Euro 2016 group qualification campaign having come out of international retirement.
But he suffered a knee injury and was substituted in the 1-0 win over world champions Germany this month and missed the final match of the round-robin phase in Poland, where a 2-1 defeat to condemned Martin O'Neill's side to the play-off encounter.
Ireland face Bosnia-Herzegovina in the first leg on November 13 before welcoming their opponents to Dublin three days later.
