Town’s U21s face Bundesliga side Borussia Mönchengladbach in the first of two Germany-based friendlies at the ATS Sportpark in Heimstetten this afternoon (KO 2.30pm CET, 1.30pm BST).

It had been expected that the Blues would field a senior squad but last night it was announced that it would be John McGreal’s U21s taking on Die Fohlen, with Cieran Slicker and Elkan Baggott the only first-team squad members expected to be involved.

Ryan Carr, Leon Ayinde and Finley Barbrook, who have featured in previous friendlies this summer, are also likely to play a part.

Ideally, Blues boss Kieran McKenna would have liked to have fielded two separate senior XIs in the games against Borussia and then Hoffenheim on Saturday, but admitted at the weekend he was struggling for numbers with several players having picked up knocks.

“We hope so because the games are pretty close apart,” McKenna said when asked whether he planned to field different sides in the two matches following last Saturday’s 2-1 defeat to Fortuna Düsseldorf at Portman Road.

“But we don’t have the bodies for that in terms of senior players at the moment, so we’re going to have to have a look at it and try and find the right balance between stretching and pushing the boys with minutes but not over-pushing them. In an ideal scenario we’d have two separate XIs to play the games.”

Borussia, who finished 14th in the Bundesliga last season, a point and two places off the relegation play-off place, have played three friendlies up to now, a 2-0 win at German fourth-tier Wegberg-Beeck, a 3-1 victory away against Dutch top flight side Fortuna Sittard and a 1-0 win against Holstein Kiel, promoted to the Bundesliga for the first time having finished second in 2. Bundesliga last season.

Die Fohlen start their season proper with a cup tie against Erzgebirge Aue on Saturday 17th August, the same weekend the Blues face Liverpool. More information on their squad can be found in a TWTD Blog here. Like all Town’s pre-season matches, the game is available on TownTV.

Town’s senior players, including sixth new signing Conor Townsend, will face Hoffenheim at the Kufstein Arena just over the border in Austria on Saturday.

Earlier in the week, forward Omari Hutchinson revealed he was back in training andAxel Tuanzebe was pictured on the plane flying to Germany, so the pair could both have their first involvement of pre-season against Die Kraichgauer.

Photo: James Ager

algarvefan added 10:22 - Aug 2 Seems a sensible decision.
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