Skipper Carlos Edwards is fine to join the rest of the squad as they travel to Yorkshire today for Tuesday’s game against Leeds at Elland Road. The 35-year-old was subbed at half-time on Saturday with a minor groin problem.
Manager Mick McCarthy says the Trinidadian has confirmed his fitness: "He’s all right, I just walked past him in the dining room and said ‘How are you, Carlos?’ and he said ‘I’m all right’, so that’s a glowing reference for him, I guess.
"He’s OK, he just had a sore groin, he had a bag of ice on it, so I wasn’t going to leave him on and risk him getting injured when I’ve got fresh legs sat there ready to go. I’ve got no reports from anybody else from Saturday, everybody’s OK.”
New right-back Frazer Richardson, who will be on loan with the Blues until the end of the season, will be on the bench with McCarthy not planning to play the 31-year-old, who has been handed the Town number 24 shirt, from the start.
"It’s unlikely when we’ve just won 2-0 against Reading and my back four were outstanding," he said. "He’ll be in the squad.”
Midfielder Luke Hyam is again set to miss out and is likely to be sidelined for around the next fortnight: "Nothing’s changed. I’ve just seen him, he’s feeling OK, but he will be.
"It’s not on his knee joint, so he’ll be able to bend it OK once it starts to heal. He was always going to be two or three weeks. Three weeks from when it happened was the prognosis at the time and that’s not changed as yet.”
Striker Sylvan Ebanks-Blake is likely to return to training next week and to match action a little while after that: "I would think Sylvan is two or three weeks as well. He was always going to be [back in training in] the first week in February.
"We tried to get him out on the grass yesterday but it had lashed it down so much it was counterproductive to somebody with a hamstring injury. He’s hoping to be training in the first week in February.”
McCarthy says the wet conditions at Playford Road — academy matches and an U21 game were postponed due to waterlogged pitches last week — have had an effect on training.
"The lads are great, they go out and train as they should whatever the weather and whatever the conditions, but the pitches have been heavy and you don’t want to be on them too long,” he said.
"We’re not training at all today because of it. For what we do today prior to a game at Leeds — and they didn’t play at the weekend — we’ll just go up to the hotel and have a swim tonight and stay off the pitches.”