1 week Ago
Ahead of Swindon visiting the Highbury Stadium this weekend, they knew that they would have a depleted group due to the injury and illness struggles the group had been experiencing in recent weeks. The situation had been bad enough when Town were without Ollie Clarke, Joel McGregor, Ryan Delaney, Harrison Minturn, Grant Hall, and Aaron Drinan on Tuesday night against AFC Wimbledon. But the picture got even worse going into Fleetwood .
Holloway said before the trip that Danny Butterworth had picked up a hamstring problem, Connor Ripley had been heavily ill, and Billy Kirkman was a doubt with a shoulder problem. Kirkman ended up travelling and playing 77 minutes of the 4-0 victory, but this did not help a huge amount as it coincided with Cox not being involved in the squad. Holloway said: “He was ill.
It was the same illness that Connor Ripley has been dealing with. “It is horrible, being violently sick at one end and doing some dodgy things at the other which you shouldn’t be talking about. “I am not having anybody with any sort of stomach bug anywhere near us, and that is what I said to Connor [Ripley].
“He had it on Wednesday night, but that is irrelevant; Jack [Bycroft] is training well, so I am going to play him.” The nature of the illness means that it is possible that Cox and Ripley could be back in time for the visit of Bradford City on Saturday lunchtime , as Swindon will be hoping to have a more clean bill of health. Drinan has already been ruled out for the rest of the season, and although hope remains that Hall could be back in time to play some role in the remainder of the campaign, he would still be a few weeks away.
Minturn has begun his journey back towards full training and has been running on the grass for a few weeks. Clarke, Delaney, McGregor, and Butterworth have all been dealing with smaller issues but do not have estimated dates for their recoveries. Holloway has said that he would prefer not to risk players at this stage of the season, with Swindon not challenging at either end of the table, he would not want to do anything which could risk their fitness for pre-season.
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