Town will again be without strike pair Daryl Murphy and Luke Varney for Saturday’s game away against leaders Middlesbrough but midfielder Teddy Bishop is expected to be back in the squad.
Manager Mick McCarthy confirmed that Murphy, who suffered a calf injury while away with the Repubic of Ireland recently, and Varney, who has a hamstring problem, will both again miss out.
"Murph’s not fit, Luke Varney’s not fit,” he said. "We are where we were in terms of injuries and knocks, bumps and bruises.”
Also missing will be Larsen Touré, who suffered a groin injury in training last week, and Giles Coke, who is out for the season having undergone knee surgery.
Loanee midfielder Ben Pringle will be back having been unavailable against his parent club Fulham on Tuesday.
Bishop played and scored for Town’s U21s in their 2-1 defeat at Sheffield United on Monday and McCarthy says that all being well he will be on the bus travelling to Teesside on Friday afternoon.
"We’ll just see how he is tomorrow,” the Town boss added. "He’s just had a break off it because if he’s going to be involved on Saturday I need him to be fresh. It was his first 90 minutes for about a million years.”
McCarthy says he’ll not field an experimental side against Boro, although might give one fringe player a run-out.
"I may have a look at one, possibly, and the view would be that if he’s involved in the squad and he’s got to play at some stage we need to know [if he's up to it] and it’s a good game to find out, that’s for sure.
"But I won’t be tinkering too much, I think we have a duty to everybody else in the league.
"I know we’ve a duty to ourselves, but we still want to win the game and try to get something out of it, so I won’t be experimenting too much. I’ll keep who it is to myself for now because I may not do it.”
McCarthy says on-loan Arsenal youngster Ainsley Maitland-Niles could still be involved this season, despite the Blues boss now looking to the future, having given Andre Dozzell his debut and included fellow youngsters Adam McDonnell, Josh Emmanuel and Myles Kenlock on the bench at Hillsborough last week.
"He’s in the squad all the time but there has been the thought that with the play-offs having gone, mathematically we get in them but I’m not holding any hope on that one, we have got players that I need to have a look at and we’ve got some of our players on the bench. He’s still involved and he may well still be involved in terms of playing.”
Might Maitland-Niles, 18, return for a second season? "We’ll have a chat, I’m not sure that will happen but he will be a much better player for the 12 months that he’s had here, no doubt, and everything that he’s enjoyed, endured, experienced in a Championship season will make him a better player, no doubt.
"Wherever he ends up, I don’t think it’ll be here, he’ll be a better player for it, certainly.”