Blackburn Rovers sweat on duo as John Eustace prepares for Coventry City return
John Eustace was giving very little away, as you’d expect, when providing an injury update on three of his players ahead of the trip to face his old club Coventry City.
The former Sky Blues midfielder and skipper has got Blackburn Rovers off to a flying start to the new Championship campaign, unbeaten in all seven league games to date, having won all four of their home games at Ewood Park and drawing all their away matches.
And the Rovers’ boss was due to assess Harry Pickering and Arnor Sigurdsson before facing the Sky Blues at the CBS Arena on Tuesday night (7.45pm), but Callum Brittain may be protected until after the international break. Left-back Pickering was withdrawn at half-time on Saturday due to illness and attacking midfielder Sigurdsson has missed the last three matches for the same reason.
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Brittain hasn’t featured since Burnley due to a knee problem and Rovers may wait until after the upcoming break to reintegrate him to the team.
“I haven’t seen the players yet so we’ll see how they report this morning when they come in and take it from there,” Eustace told the Lancashire Telegraph.
“For Pick to play 45 minutes on Saturday after being ill, he did remarkably well. We will see how he is, if he’s not available we’ll look at our options in that area. He’s not the first player this season to push through that. All of the lads want to help the team and that’s the mentality.
“Callum has a chance before the international break but it’s important that we don’t lose him for any longer than we have already.
“He’s an important player for this squad. For the sake of one or two games, we might have to protect him but I know he’s pushing to get back in with the group. He had a minor setback last week and so we have to balance it with him.”
He added: “Arnor is in the building, he trained on Friday and Saturday. He will train again today and then we will assess the situation and see how he feels.”