New signing 'desperate' to get involved as pair miss Birmingham City friendly

The 29-year-old midfielder joined the club on Wednesday after penning a two-year deal, but that came too late for him to feature either against Southend United that same evening or when City visited Sixfields yesterday.

However, currently on his own individual training programme having missed the first three weeks of pre-season, the plan is for Lemonheigh-Evans to play some part in Town’s final two friendlies against Cambridge (Tuesday) and Solihull Moors (Saturday).

“It’s just a bit early for Connor,” confirmed Chris Hogg after Saturday’s 2-0 defeat. “He was desperate to get involved but we have given him his own programme to follow for the last couple of days and he’s done some work to try and get up to speed.

“We will see what next week looks like for him. I’m desperate for him to get involved and he’s desperate to get on the pitch and it would be really good to try and see him next week.”

Another player missing on Saturday as Kamarai Swyer. The 23-year-old played over 70 minutes at Southend in the week but was not in the squad for the game against Birmingham.

“Kam just picked up a little sickness bug,” Hogg revealed. “He’s stayed away from the group for the last couple of days after being sick because that’s the protocol in terms of making sure no one picks anything up.”

Conor McCarthy and Jack Burroughs remain injured while the club continue to be extremely cautious over Liam Shaw’s fitness after 18 months out of the game. The midfielder has trained with the rest of the squad but is not yet ready for competitive action.