Brady fears the worst as Cobblers' injury crisis deepens with three more picking up problems against Newport

Cobblers could be missing 12 players for Easter Monday’s game against Gillingham after suffering three more injuries during their defeat to Newport County on Friday.

Aaron McGowan was already playing out of position at centre-back when he sustained a serious-looking ankle injury during the first-half at Rodney Parade. Town’s vice-skipper was later seen on crutches and in a protective boot.

Akin Odimayo has recently returned from injury himself and was only advised to play limited minutes against Newport but Jon Brady was forced to bring him on earlier than planned in McGowan's place. He went off in stoppage-time with a recurrence of his hamstring problem.

In-between that, Jack Sowerby did not reappear for the second-half. The midfielder also struggled with hamstring complaint last week but was deemed fit enough to play on Friday after scan results came back clear.

Should those three all miss Monday's game, Brady has major problems, particularly in defence.

"Aaron McGowan goes down and really it was beyond AK to go on so early,” said Brady. “There were strict instructions in terms of certain minutes that he could play but he was the only round peg in a round hole that we had. I knew it was risk but what else could we do?

"He then feels his hamstring again towards the end and Aaron's now in a boot. AK's hamstring is very sore and then Jack Sowerby had to come off at half-time. I don't want to go into it (Sowerby's injury) too much.

"As I said before, people don't know what we go through during the week to get a team out there. You are pushing players to the limit when they should only have limited minutes.

"We can't do anything else. That's just where we are at. That's three more first-team players injured today and that's the worst body blow. We need to do a head count and see what we have available."