Town boss Kieran McKenna has revealed left-back Conor Townsend is facing a long spell on the sidelines with an ACL injury suffered at Auxerre last week, while Leif Davis and Jaden Philogene remain doubts for Friday’s season opener at Birmingham City.
Townsend collapsed to the pitch with no one near him in obvious agony during the friendly last weekend and had a brace on his leg and was walking on crutches after the match.
McKenna confirmed that the former Scunthorpe and West Brom man has had bad news and will require an op.
Davis missed that game with a hip problem, while Philogene landed awkwardly on his ankle in the second half.
"Mixed, really,” McKenna said when asked about the injury situation. "Conor Townsend was a big shame last weekend. Conor’s got an ACL injury, so he’s seeing a surgeon this week and we’ll get the operation at the earliest opportunity.
"A big, big blow for Conor as the person and the professional that he is and a big blow for us as well with what we believed he would give us this season in the left-back position.
"And Jaden and Leif still, as it stands, struggling, to be honest. Both will be assessed, we’ll give them both right to the last minute if we can because both are important players, who had good pre-seasons up until that point. Both are at this point struggling for certainly the next game.”
Asked whether he will look to replace Townsend via a new signing, McKenna added: "It’s certainly something that we have to assess. It’s a pretty new situation so one that we weren’t hoping for, we were hoping that with Leif and Conor we’d be really strong in that department.
"The positives are that we have an outstanding left-back in the building and we have two right-backs in terms of Ashley [Young] and Ben Johnson, who have both played left-back in their careers.
"That gives us some options there, but it’s certainly something we’re reviewing at the moment to see if it’s an area that we want or we need to add to.”
In addition to Townsend and Davis being sidelined with injuries, youngster Somto Boniface, who was on the bench on a number of occasions at the end of last season, has also missed pre-season with the U21s due to a knee problem.