Town boss Kieran McKenna says he will make late calls tomorrow on the fitness of right wing-back Wes Burns and summer signing Dominic Ball ahead of Saturday's trip to Shrewsbury.
Burns missed the win at Burton on Tuesday with a groin problem suffered in the warm-up ahead of the MK Dons victory last Saturday, while Ball picked up an ankle injury in pre-season.
"We’ll have to make late calls tomorrow on both, to be honest,” McKenna said. "Dominic has just done his first full session with the team without feeling anything at all, so that’s a big step forward and a positive, but he hasn’t done too much team training so we’ll have to make a judgement call on that one.
"Wes is still feeling a little bit the effects of the issue he had last weekend, so he didn’t fully train today, he worked with the fitness coaches and we’re going to see how he is in training tomorrow, whether he’s ready for availability.”
McKenna says Ball, who joined the club having been released by QPR in the summer, being available will be a boost for his options in the centre of midfield.
"It would certainly give us more cover,” he said. "Samy [Morsy] and Lee [Evans] have started the season very, very strongly, of course, and it’s a really well established partnership that is improving now as well.
"I thought there were good signs in the few signs that they played together before Lee got injured but I think they’re both developing individually and that helps them develop as a pair.
"But having Dominic there is exactly what we want. We want real strength in depth across all the positions and I think with the three of them and those that we have below them I think we’re really strong there and when Dominic gets back to full capacity I think we’ll have great competition and great strength in that position.”
McKenna says recent signing Richard Keogh is also getting closer to making his Town debut having missed the start of the season at Blackpool with a groin injury.
"Not far, he’s trained again fully today, so he’s been involved with the session,” the Northern Irishman said. "I think he’s probably not up to his absolute full level of sharpness yet in terms of adapting to our training programme and accumulating sessions after coming back from the little issue that he had at the end of his spell at Blackpool.
"I don’t think he’s far away, to be honest. I think probably in the next few weeks we’ll definitely see him all being well in some match action and he’s really contributing well in the training sessions so far.
"He travelled up with us on Tuesday and was with the squad for the two-day trip up to Burton and that’s something we’ll look to do very often with someone of his ilk.
"Obviously if he’s playing or on the bench, then great, he’ll be involved, but even on other days he’ll travel and be around the playing group, be around the staff and shares his experience and that’s something that he’s really willing and able to contribute. We’ll use him certainly in that way right through the course of the season.”
Asked whether what was a physical encounter at Burton might impact upon his team selection at Shrewsbury, McKenna reflected: "It will be a contributing factor. It certainly was a bruising game in terms of the challenges and the aerial balls, it wasn’t a massive game in terms of running because the ball was in play so little at times.
"There were so many stoppages, so I think you find in those games that the distances covered aren’t always so high. The sprint distances covered aren’t always so high so there aren’t so many concerns from that point of view.
"Obviously we got a lot of travel this week, I think it’s the furthest that we’re probably going to travel in any Tuesday-Saturday across the season, so that comes into consideration as well because that can take it out of you a little bit.
"We’ll weigh it all up and as always look at Shrewsbury very closely and what’s going to be the right balance and right strategies we think to win the game and who is going to be physically most able to contribute that and we’ll pick the team from there.”
He says the statistic relating to the time the ball is in play is one he takes note of: "We do check it, I haven’t checked it from Tuesday night but it is an interesting stat and it’s something that I know the authorities are really looking at and trying to address across football because people pay money to come and watch football matches and they want to see a good amount of ball-in-play time and I know the referees are trying address that with the time added on.
"We had nine minutes added on at Forest Green in a match that had 54 minutes of ball-in-play time, which is way, way, way above the league average. We’ve had games at Portman Road where the ball’s in play for not much more than 40 minutes and there’s five minutes added on.
"I think the intent is there from the referees to address the issue and I think there are obviously still some teething problems in that in how many minutes they add on and how they can address it, but I think the intent is right and important and it’s something that has to be looked at.”