Inverness CT manager John Hughes admits Ryan Christie's influence is sorely missed in the Highlands but has backed the 21-year-old to stay patient and make his mark at Celtic.

The Scotland U21 star signed for the Scottish champions in the summer transfer window before spending the first half of the campaign back at Inverness.

A knee injury saw the youngster return to Celtic early with Hughes' men struggling to repeat last season's heroics without Christie's creative spark.

After recovering from his knock, last year's Scottish football writers' Young Player of the Year has been restricted to just 40 minutes of league action with Ronny Deila's men but Hughes has few regrets over the promising attacker's progress.

Hughes said: "He just needs to be patient and not get despondent. The word I'm getting back is that he's starting to show people on the training pitch and in the U21s the quality he has.

"It won't be too long until he's in the first team. You have to remember that he's coming back from a serious injury, we let him go back there to get proper rehabilitation properly.

"People think that's him back and ready for selection then they're ready to go but that's not always the case. We have one or two like that here and that's probably the same for Ryan Christie.

"He's sorely missed I have to say. The other night in the hurly burly of the first half, we just needed a player with that know-how to come off the play and put his foot on the ball or a wee bit of magic.

"He's sorely missed but that's football and we just get on with it."