Alfie Doughty has been ruled out of Luton’s trip to Middlesbrough tomorrow due to the ankle injury he picked up late in the midweek win over Cardiff.
A stretcher had been brought onto the pitch for the Town wing back, but he was able to get to his feet and limp off, but then hobbled back on the pitch to see out the final few minutes, as the Hatters had used all of their substitution allowance.
Doughty has had a scan but because the Cardiff game was on Wednesday night, the club don’t yet know the extent of the damage, with the results of a scan not yet available and the wing back still to see a specialist.
Boss Rob Edwards said: “It would be too soon for him, this game now. (It’s his) ankle, hopefully not too bad, but this one’s too soon.
“We can’t do anything about it now. With a quick turnaround in the game, it’s just come too soon. So, hopefully, it’s not going to be too long, but it’s a bit early to tell at the moment, how long it’ll be. But there’s no chance of this one.
“He’s had a scan and then he’ll be seeing a specialist. I haven’t had results and all of that sort of stuff yet.”
The game will be too soon for defenders Reece Burke and Mads Andersen and asked if he’ll have the same squad that played Cardiff, minus Doughty, the manager said: “Hopefully everyone’s still available, but let’s say it’s still quite fresh, so some of them are still a bit sore and feeling one or two bits, so we’ll give them as much time as we can to. And then, you know, we’ll try and freshen things up in areas that we need to as well.”
Regardless of Doughty’s injury and any niggles from Wednesday, Edwards said he will have to make changes for Luton’s third game in a week, following a draw and victory.
“We built up a bit a bit of a rhythm, so we’ve got to try and get it right,” the manager said on having to shuffle his pack.
“Clearly, Alfie’s one that’s going to be forced anyway, so we’ll have to just try and get that right, but learn from the other week with the turnaround and, obviously this time, travelling a little bit further as well.
“So, I need to try and make sure that we have that the energy and the freshness, that can hopefully allow us to try and play the way we want to.
“But we want to try and make a few more passes than we did last time against Coventry. And another one, away from home as well, was trying to keep the ball a bit better than what we did in the last game.
“So, there’s a few things to think about with that, but of course (we’re) coming off the back of a good win and a decent performance as well, so there’s a few in with a little bit of confidence now. So we’ll just try and get that balance right.”
Victor Moses was an unused sub against Cardiff and Edwards said: “We’ve certainly got one or two options now that can come in for Alf,. And, of course, there’s one of those, that’s got really good qualities and has done well. So yeah, it does help us, there’s no doubt about that.
“But because this is the third game in the week as well, there’s a couple that played the other day that, they’re not injured, but we’ve got to make sure that we’re not breaking as well.
“It’s still a little bit to think about before tomorrow. That game is going to come quick now. It’s not like it’s tomorrow night, it’s almost the morning time tomorrow.
“So yeah, good options. We’re getting there, but we’re not there yet where everyone’s fully resilient and bulletproof I don’t think at the moment.”
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