Prior to Rovers’ rescheduled 2nd round FA Cup replay away at Crewe Alexandra – (which is now due to be played on Wednesday 13th December, with a 19:45 kick-off) – Rovers boss Tony Mowbray spoke to the clubs’ media team about his potential team selection following the injuries that Peter Whittingham and Corry Evans picked up in the 3-2 win over Peterborough at the weekend.
“We got a few knocks and bruises at the weekend. Peter Whittingham’s pulled his calf, so he may be out for a couple of weeks. Corry (Evans) has had a lot of stitches on his knee after a challenge during the game. His knee is a bit sore and a bit swollen and we have to see how he settles down, but as far as I know there’s no ligament damage. Ben Gladwin is still out, as he’s just started his rehabilitation process. We’ve pretty much got the same set of players, barring the two that got injured, for the game against Crewe.
“This has been a really frustrating period for Darragh (Lenihan). He’s a warrior-type of footballer and I’m pretty sure he’ll be desperate to contribute to the team’s efforts, but we need to wait and see how he gets on. What’s most important is that he’s over his injury, there’s no reoccurrence in his rehabilitation. He’s a very important player to our squad, we’ve missed him being around the group on a daily basis, so hopefully his progression back into the first-team is a short and successful one.
“I think he’ll be like a new signing when he returns, I enjoyed working with Darragh last season, he’s really positive, dominant aerially, fast across the ground and has good distribution, all the qualities that you’d want in a centre-half. He’s got some stiff competition of course, but his job now is to work his way back to full fitness and regain his confidence back, so that when he does get a chance to play, he’s ready both mentally and physically.
“It was very important to see Craig Conway come back and play a full 90 minutes for us on Saturday. We had long discussions beforehand about whether he was ready to go as he had a few injury issues that he was upset with, up-to the point where he felt that he was breaking down, so we gave him a little bit more time to ready himself mentally, which he did and I thought he did well in the game. Hopefully, that’s the end of his injuries and he can now stake a claim in the team every week now. I think he came back at an important time for us, with the loss of Elliott Bennett for four games. Craig’s a similar characteristic-type footballer to Elliott, in that they both graft for the team, they’ve both also got that understanding of the game, as well as the quality to impact on the game.”
Mowbray was then asked about his potential team selection for the replay, and whether he’d have the liberty to rotate as much as he did in the first tie.
“I don’t think I can change the side as much as I did before. The injuries have obviously impacted us as well and Evans obviously played in the first tie, but I think we’ve still got some good options. It’s a game that we have to be positive in, we have to go there with an intention of winning the game by playing on the front-foot. We’re mindful of their strengths and their qualities and they may see this as a good opportunity for themselves to go through, but we have to go there and do what we’ve been doing.
“I think at 3-0 up, you think the game is almost done, but circumstances changed that. To play, almost a whole half, with 9 men is incredibly difficult, because we’re playing against professional footballers who can find the space and make their opportunities count at set-pieces, which they did. I give Crewe a lot of credit for getting back into the game, but we just have to go there and replicate our play from when we had eleven on the field.”
