Mark Robinson has backed Will Nightingale to come back stronger after an injury to our centre-back that could keep him out for up to four months.
Physio Tim Maynard confirmed that Will had suffered a high ankle sprain, plus a sprain to his ACL and his Posterolateral corner (knee).
Though understandably disappointed by the news as he felt that Will was playing the best football of his career, Robbo said there will be plenty of support for him to make a full recovery.
“It’s important people realise that it’s not an old injury or anything like that, it’s an injury that could have happened to anyone,” said our Head Coach. “He was doing a recovery run to make a tackle, and his foot just got caught in the grass, very similar to Paul Kalambayi at Crewe when he slipped behind the goal.
“It’s not going to require an operation, but it’s just a real shame for him as he had probably been in the most consistent form of his career. His stats back that up. Compared to the other centre-backs in the league he’s right up there with goals and in everything that he does. He has been absolutely fantastic for us.
“We are fully behind him, and we will support him. He has messaged me already and said, ‘Robbo, I want to be a part of everything, and be around to support the boys’. That’s Will all over. He will want to get back on the training pitch as quickly as he can and drive what we are trying to achieve here. We will get him back and he will be flying again.”
Robbo added that Paul Kalambayi, Dan Csoka, and Darius Charles will all provide other options at centre-back in the coming weeks.
“Dan will be back from international duty on Thursday, and we are hoping that PK will be available. He has trained today, and he has come through fine, so we should have PK and Dan back.
“Darius joined in today as well, and he played 45 minutes against Brentford, so he would be fine too if we needed him.”
Click on the link below to listen to more from Robbo, including our Head Coach talking about the progress of Henry Lawrence, who played the full 90 minutes for England Under-20s in a 5-0 away win versus the Czech Republic.