Blues boss Kieran McKenna says the international break has been useful to help some of the recent signings settle in, however, with a number of regular starters away it wasn’t possible to do too much directly working towards Friday’s home game against Sheffield United.

Town signed four players in the days leading up to the transfer window closing, Ivan Azon, Darnell Furlong, Marcelino Nunez and Sindre Walle Egeli.

The Norwegian youngster has been away with his nation’s U21s but McKenna says the last fortnight has been advantageous for some of the others, Nunez having returned to training after injury earlier this week.

“Beneficial, especially for the new players, we’re probably talking about Darnell [Furlong], Ivan [Azon], people like that,” McKenna said.

“That’s been really beneficial because it’s been a chance to have some time with them, some sessions on the grass, get to know them a little bit better.

“But for the group a mixed purpose really, because it’s hard to really fully commit to doing team things or things related to the game because we had some players, including the club captain [Dara O’Shea] in Armenia until Tuesday night.

“We worked with individuals, we worked in units and in small groups and I think we got some really good time here. Obviously, the build-up to this game has been really, really short.”

Looking back to the 2-2 draw with Derby County prior to the international break, via Jack Clarke’s last-gasp penalty, McKenna was asked whether that was a big moment, going into the hiatus with a draw rather than a second defeat on the bounce.

“I don’t know, certainly we weren’t doing cartwheels around the dressing room or anything like that,” he reflected. “Will it be a big point at the end of the season? Who knows. Hopefully so in a positive way.

“I think the value comes across the course of the season with things like that because once you’ve had a late goal, and we’ve had two late goals now, the belief grows that you can score late goals, that you can impact games off the bench.

“That’s something that accumulates to more than the one point we got from that game, it’s something that can accumulate to many, many more points across the course of the season.

“Hopefully it will give us more belief in those circumstances and hopefully we can follow it up with a good result on Friday night.”


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