Luton will travel to in-form Blackburn Rovers tomorrow with Liam Walsh available after a hamstring injury, but Town are expecting to navigate the busy Christmas period without six other crocked players.
Midfielder Walsh has been absent for three weeks, but was training today, and will travel to Ewood Park to face a Rovers side on a five-game winning run, the last four all by a 1-0 scoreline.
Manager Rob Edwards said: “Hopefully (we’ve got) the addition of Liam Walsh to the squad as well. So that’s nice. Everyone got through it (Tuesday’s win over Stoke), yeah, hopefully we can have one more. That’s the squad at the moment and let’s go again. He’s (Walsh) trained today, which is really good. He’s going to travel up and be a part of it.”
Hamstrings have been an major issue for a number of Hatters this calendar year and asked if there’s been any learning in terms of easing players back into action, Edwards said: “There’s always things that we’re looking at. Why has that happened? Sometimes it’s unavoidable and sometimes there’s things that maybe we can do better as a as a group as well,
“On this occasion, thankfully it wasn’t such a bad one. But, that being said, we didn’t want to miss him. The impact that he had in the (Hull City) game when he come on was, was a really good one in that last performance for him as well.
“So, it’s really disappointing when we have anyone out, especially with the muscle injury.”
However, Walsh is the only injured player expected to return this side of Christmas, with Alfie Doughty (ankle), Reuell Walters (broken foot), Reece Burke (quad), Amari’i Bell (hamstring), Shandon Baptiste (calf) and Teden Mengi (knee) all out.
Asked about the group and when they may return, Edwards said: “They’ll still be a little while. Reuell has been doing relatively well, been out in the grass in the early stages of his rehab, so that’s good.
“Amari’i is not a long term one, so hopefully he’ll be the next one back, fingers crossed. We’ll see. A couple of others, Shandon, Teden, they’re a little bit longer at the moment. Burke is working hard, but again, a little bit longer.
“Alfie now is getting down to hopefully the last few weeks of it. We’re hoping for him to return early January, fingers crossed.”
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