 Friday, 28th Aug 2009 13:16 Midfield pair Lee Martin and Jack Colback are doubts ahead of Saturday’s home game against Preston North End due to groin injuries sustained at Peterborough. The Blues will again be without Jaime Peters, but Pablo Couñago is likely to make his first Championship start of the season. Martin and Colback will be assessed today and manager Roy Keane is hopeful that the duo will be fine to face the Lilywhites. Midfielder Jaime Peters is still absent due to the ankle injury he suffered in the 0-0 draw with Leicester. The Canadian international, who Keane says the Blues have been missing, is back in training and ahead of schedule but Saturday’s game is likely to come too soon for him. David Norris and Luciano Civelli aren’t due back until the turn of the year due to their knee injuries, while Ben Thatcher is also still to make a return from his knee problem and appears not to be in Keane’s long-term plans. Better news is that Pablo Couñago came through the Carling Cup defeat at Peterborough without aggravating his groin injury and Keane says he will be in Saturday’s 18: “Pablo was one of the pluses from the other night. He had about 55-60 minutes and there’s been no reaction and he’ll certainly be in the squad.” The early withdrawals of Couñago and strike partner Tamás Priskin at London Road could be a hint that they will start against Preston. Priskin opened his Town account against Peterborough, Couñago creating the goal and looking lively throughout his time on the pitch. In midfield, Martin and Colback could keep their places if they are fit, while Alan Quinn will hope for his first league start of the season after another lively display against the Posh. Jon Walters may be left out, as he was at London Road, with Martin continuing on the right. Colin Healy and Liam Trotter are most likely to fill the central holding role. At the back, Alex Bruce has been confirmed as skipper and will start alongside Pim Balkestein with Damien Delaney probably keeping the left-back berth he occupied at Peterborough. David Wright will continue in the other full-back role. In goal, Richard Wright will be making his 347th appearance for the Blues, which sees him overtake Roy Bailey and become the keeper to have played the second most games for the club after Paul Cooper (575). Wright is also now 20th in the club’s overall appearance table. Keane says he will include one or two youngsters in his squad with Ed Upson having impressed the Blues boss in recent weeks and having made an appearance from the bench in midweek. Shane O’Connor could also come into his manager’s thoughts after some promising displays in the reserves. The Blues boss is expecting a difficult game against a Preston side which has won two and drawn two of their four league games: “They’ve started the season very strongly and the way we’ve started it’ll be a very tough game for us. But we’re looking forward to it and it’s an opportunity for our players to put a few things right that we’ve not really done so far this season. “Same with the cup game the other night. We started the game well but we just don’t seem to be able to finish the job off at this moment in time.” Keane says he is more frustrated than angry at his side’s poor start to the season: “I wouldn’t say I’m angry, it just makes me more aware of how big the job is. I could make a few excuses for you, a few things haven’t gone our way, but we’ll keep battling on, trying to get it right tomorrow.” Preston boss Alan Irvine says Town will climb the Championship table from their current lowly position: "I would expect Ipswich to rise up the league in time, they've too many good players not to. "Roy Keane knows the Championship, he did a great job getting Sunderland promoted, and their current form is probably just a blip as everyone settles down. "It would be terrific if we could come back from Ipswich still unbeaten, hopefully with a victory. If that happened we will have made a really good start to the season, I couldn't be unhappy if we were unbeaten in seven games. "But there's a big job to do first, it's going to be a tough game and we'll need to play really well to get something." Centre-half Youl Mawene is again expected to miss out due to a hamstring injury with Liam Chilvers likely to deputise, while midfielder Barry Nicholson is out with a broken leg. Town have a poor record against Preston historically, winning eight games (seven in the league), drawing six (six) and losing 10 (nine). If Town lose on Saturday it will be their worst ever August at Championship level. Last year, the Lilywhites won the opening game of the season 2-1 at Portman Road, Kevin Lisbie putting the Blues in front and Paul McKenna and Simon Whaley subsequently winning the game for the visitors. At Deepdale in February, North End were again victorious, Callum Davidson (pen), Jon Parkin and Stephen Elliott netting for the home side and Tommy Miller getting his usual couple of goals against his former loan club. Midfielder Veliche Shumulikoski joined Preston from Town in the summer for a fee of around £400,000 and has so far played in three of this season’s games. None of his team-mates have played for the Blues, while no current member of the Town squad has been a Lilywhite. Issue 98 of the TWTD fanzine will be on sale prior to Saturday’s game. It features the memories of Sir Bobby Robson’s time with the Blues recently collected on the site. In addition to the tributes to Sir Bob, Gavin Barber looks at the current rebranding of Town, Roger Hermiston reviews Roy Keane’s 2002 autobiography and Ray Slegg travels to Sweden for the European U21 Championships in amongst most of the usual sort of stuff. Look out for our sellers by Sir Alf, next to Planet Blue and by the Portman Road entrance to the Greene King Stand. Single issues or six-issue subscriptions from £9.50 are available here. Saturday’s referee is Paul Taylor from Enfield, who has shown 22 yellow and no red cards so far this season. Taylor’s last Town game was the 3-1 home victory over Bristol City last December when he red-carded Alex Bruce, while coincidentally he was also in charge of last season’s Town-Preston fixture, booking only Neil Mellor. Squad from: R Wright, Lee-Barrett, D Wright, Delaney, Smith, Bruce, Balkestein, McAuley, Healy, Quinn, Walters, Colback, Martin, Upson, Garvan, O’Connor, Couñago, Priskin, Wickham, Stead.
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