Reuell Walters will miss a busy period for Luton Town after suffering a groin injury which leaves Luton short of right-sided options as Isaiah Jones is still some way short of a full recovery from a stress fracture in his back.
Young wing-back Walters has started both of the Hatters’ opening league games, but he was withdrawn at halftime in Saturday’s 2-0 win at Peterborough United after suffering a going injury that is now set to sideline him for at least the rest of the month.
“[It’s his] groin. A couple of weeks, two to three weeks, we expect Rue to miss. [It’s] disappointing, for Reu and for us, especially in such a busy period of games,” Bloomfield said of the former Arsenal youth.
While frustrating, Luton have won both of their opening two League One games without conceding a goal and the midweek Carabao Cup at Coventry exit was used to provide more minutes to players still striving for peak fitness.
West Ham loan signing Gideon Kodua made an impressive Hatters bow in Walters’ role and could be considered for Saturday’s League One clash at Bradford City. And after Christ Makosso was handed a three-match ban for violent conduct, Mark McGuinness came through his first 90 minutes unscathed after a viral illness saw him lose weight and sent home from the club’s Slovenian pre-season camp.
Bloomfield said: “Mark’s a really big player for our football club, a big leader, a captain in the making, I believe. A really big player for us, really important player for us, so with losing out with Christ to have Mark back is obviously. great.”
Lamine Fanne also made his first start after three pre-season weeks out due to a concussion, while Tahith Chong has is back on the grass in training, though not ready yet after a groin injury sidelined him early in the summer.
Bloomfield said: “It’s been positive in terms of players starting to work the way back toward fitness.”
Teden Mengi, who was injured in pre-season, remains sidelined along with Jacob Brown and Elijah Adebyo, who are longer term absentees, while Jones is booked in for a scan to provide an update on his recovery.
On Jones’ recovery, Bloomfield said: “There’s no timescale. It’s a stress fracture, we’re waiting for him to have a scan next Monday, I think it might be, and that’ll be six weeks post-injury and if that’s reflecting well, he can then start picking up his rehab so he’s still a little way away.
“Obviously one of the reasons we play three at the back was because Izzy’s an unbelievable wingback and so to lose him and Alf around the same time was disappointing and we’re now working towards the next boys that can pick up the baton and do that job as we see fit.
“But yeah, he’s not imminent is, but hopefully in the next sort of six, seven weeks-ish, it depends how his scan goes. If there’s still a little bit of fracture in there, he’s going to take a little bit longer, so we’re kind of waiting for that.”
He added: “We’ve got to be careful with him because obviously a stress fracture injury. We don’t want to force him too quick and then sets himself back.
“We hope in the next couple of months-ish that we’ll have him back. But again, we have to let him take each stage, tick it off before we can give an exact timescale. We’d all love to have a fully fit squad right now ready to compete, but we haven’t.”
New signing Hakeem Odoffin was spotted at the CBS Arena on Tuesday, but is still recovering from surgery, after an MRI scan in his medical flagged an unexpected non-musculoskeletal issue.
Bloomfield said: “He’s had a successful operation. We’re mightily relieved that we went down the surgery route and it was just a little operation that he needed because had he taken another blocked another ball and got hit, you know, it could have been not great for him. So [it was] very good for us to pick that up on the medical.
“He’s sorted. He’s now taking a slow road back to recovery, so he’s on his feet but he’s not on the grass yet. We’ve got to let everything heal and get him back again. [He’s] someone who we’re really looking forward to having when he’s back fully fit.”
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