Martin O’Neill believes Séamus Coleman is already looking to the future following his double leg fracture but remains “pretty down” as he comes to terms with the length of his injury lay-off.

The Republic of Ireland captain remains in hospital in Dublin after undergoing surgery on Saturday morning to pin the broken tibia and fibula in his right leg.

The injury came as a result of a challenge by the Wales full-back Neil Taylor during Friday night’s 0-0 World Cup qualifying draw at the Aviva Stadium.

“I think he’s just beginning to come to terms with it,” O’Neill said. “I saw him yesterday [on Sunday] and he’s still pretty down about it. He’s not in as much pain, the operation went very well and it’s just a matter of coming to terms with it.”

O’Neill and his medical staff have refused to put a timescale on Coleman’s recovery following successful surgery but the Republic of Ireland manager insists the 28-year-old is taking a pragmatic approach to the setback.

“You know the sort of pain that he’s going to be going through, obviously the immediate pain and then his recovery.

“It’s a major blow, not only for the player, but obviously for his family, people who were at the game watching that.

“But as Séamus mentioned to me the other day, he just said that it has happened now, he can’t do anything about it and it’s what he does now in the next few months that is very, very important.”

The injury soured Friday’s game in Dublin and O’Neill has admitted the defender’s presence has been missed from the camp, speaking before Tuesday’s friendly against Iceland.

“It’s a bad blow for the player, who has been terrific for us,” O’Neill added. “He’s having a wonderful season at Everton and he has been missed around the place over the last couple of days too. I think he’s very positive and he will get into recovery mode as quickly as possible and then it’s up to him.”

O’Neill is hoping he will return as good as ever having seen the former Celtic striker Henrik Larsson bounce back from a similar injury.

He said: “Before I went to Celtic, about five or six months before that, Henrik Larsson had a very serious injury and he recovered magnificently and the injury didn’t bother him again from then until the end of his career, so players have recovered.

“Great players have broken their legs and come back, and Séamus, obviously it’s very early for him to start considering all those things, but he is positive.

“Naturally, as I mentioned earlier at the start, he’s down, as he would be as the realisation that he is going to be out of action for quite some considerable time has dawned on him, so those type of things don’t just take five minutes to get over.

“But he’s very strong, he’s got a lot of good people around him, his family is very, very strong as well and he is positive that he will be back and as good as ever.”