Town boss Mick McCarthy has confirmed that central defender Adam Webster has been ruled out for the remainder of the season having suffered damaged ligaments in training earlier this week.
"He’s out for the rest of the season,” McCarthy said. "He’s done his ankle ligaments, ruptured them, so he needs an operation.
"It just happened in training, he went to nick a ball and he rolled his ankle and he’s ruptured them unfortunately.
"It’s a blow for him and for us. It hurts everybody when you get somebody like that injured, but he’s on the upward curve, he’s had his move, he’s been excellent. And then for us it’s sad that we’re losing such a good player for the rest of the season.”
Town, who can include new signings Kieffer Moore and Jordan Spence in their squad for Saturday's trip to Huddersfield, the duo having been unavailable for Tuesday’s FA Cup defeat at Lincoln, have had significant injury problems this season, although Brett Pitman (calf) and Teddy Bishop (ankle) are close to making their returns.
"If we hadn’t had bad luck we’d have had no luck at all with injuries,” McCarthy reflected. "We’ve got a couple coming back though today, Pits has trained, Teddy Bishop has trained, so they’re getting closer. But it’s been a bad season for injuries.
"Pits will travel, he’ll be in the squad but Teddy will play on Sunday [for the U23s in the Premier League Cup] at Liverpool.”
He says on-loan Crystal Palace man Jonny Williams is undergoing his rehab at Playford Road but is still some way off a return to action having undergone shoulder surgery.
"Jonny is here, he’s progressing nicely but there was a time limit to it and that’s still the same,” he said.
"He’s not going to be any longer, there’s nothing gone wrong with it, he should be back when they said he was going to be back, the beginning of March, I believe.”
Left-back Myles Kenlock is out for around another couple of weeks with a calf injury, while David McGoldrick (hamstring) is expected back for the trip to Preston a week on Saturday.
Luke Hyam (knee) and Tommy Smith (back) are both back in training after surgery and are expected to play U23s games at the beginning of February. Midfielder Giles Coke (knee) also remains sidelined after an operation.