Town boss Kieran McKenna is hoping wideman Wes Burns will be back in training tomorrow having suffered a hamstring injury while away with Wales, while George Hirst trained yesterday and Christian Walton is making good progress but Janoi Donacien remains sidelined.

Burns was ruled out of Wales’ Euro 2024 qualifier with Latvia on Monday having suffered the niggle having come on as a sub in the friendly with South Korea.

“He’s not too bad,” McKenna said when asked about the 28-year-old’s fitness. “It was the right decision for him to be withdrawn but we’ve scanned him and there’s no major tear or anything like that. He’s recovered well and we’ll hopefully have him training tomorrow.”

McKenna says everyone else who was away on international duty has come back without a problem.

“We’re still waiting on Elkan [Baggott] but other than Elkan, Sam [Morsy] was the last one back in, he was back in today, so that’s been great,” he said.

“It’s been nice to see them come back in, nice to see them add to their international honours and coming back into a group that’s trained really well and prepared really well, makes it easier for them to slot back in. It’s been lovely to get the whole group or almost the whole group back together today.”

Hirst came off in the first half of the 3-2 victory over Cardiff with a recurrence of his adductor injury and McKenna is hopeful the former Owls striker will be fine to play some part against his former club.

“He’s recovered pretty well,” the Town manager said. “He trained yesterday with the group and will hopefully train tomorrow with the group. If he gets through that fine, we’re hopeful he’ll have some involvement tomorrow.

But Donacien still isn’t ready for a return having come off in the first half of the 1-0 win at QPR.

“Still got some ongoing issues with his adductors,” McKenna continued. “He’s making some progress but still some issues to be resolved, so he’s still working through his rehabilitation.”

Better news is that keeper Walton, who has been out since pre-season after suffering a plantar fascia tear, is closing in on a return.

“Christian is doing well,” the Blues boss said. “It was good to see this morning because he was outside on the grass in boots and gloves and diving around the goal and working really hard with [keeper-coach] Rene [Gilmartin] and feeling good.

“He’s getting closer, he’s not integrated into training with the full group yet, hopefully that will be over the next week or so and then we’ll start to build him back in the right way to be available for games as soon as possible.”

Photo: Matchday Images

wkf07tsu added 15:40 - Sep 14 Any word on Axel?
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Kentish_Tractor added 16:10 - Sep 14 I think Axel might still be injured? I think we signed him before anybody else could take him, on the assumption that he's not too far off?
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Linkboy13 added 18:25 - Sep 14 Great news on Walton who is undoubtedly our number one keeper but Hladky has performed admerably dispite having a shaky defence in front of him so i would stick with him on Saturday. Burns is one of McKenna's first names in his starting line up and if anywhere near fit he will start. It would be good to know how fit this Axel geezer actually is and how long he's away from first team selection. Williams should come in for Clarke who looked way off the pace against Cardiff. I think most people are anxious to see what Jack Taylor can do over 90 minutes. He's a completely different player to both Morsy and Luongo and more of a creative passer. It might be difficult to fit him into the system.

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