Northampton Town 0 Birmingham City 1: As it happened and reaction
and live on Freeview channel 276
Keep up-to-date with events at Sixfields on our live blog below...
Cobblers v Birmingham LIVE
Key Events
- Town host Blues in second pre-season friendly
- Number of trialists expected to be involved again
- One or two injured players may feature
One down, four to go
Hello and welcome to coverage of tonight’s pre-season game between Northampton and Birmingham.
It’s Town’s second friendly following Saturday’s narrow defeat to Leicester City. We’ll have team news shortly.
Injured players to return?
"We've got a small group of players that will hopefully be back involved with us in the next week or 10 days, which is great to see. It's not nice being an injured player and not being able to do your job but they're all champing at the bit to get involved. But some of the lessons we learned from last season was that if you throw them in too early, it could backfire, so we'll filter them in as slowly and as cautiously as possible.”
Marc Richards, first-team coach, has suggested Cobblers could welcome back some of their nine injured players tonight. Akin Odimayo, Ali Koiki and Jack Sowerby are closest to returning.
Three trialists start for the Cobblers tonight with more on the bench. Odimayo, Sowerby and Koiki back involved but no McWilliams or Hoskins.
XI: Dadge, Sherring (c), Dyche, Brough, Trialist, Hondermarck, Pinnock, Trialist, Trialist, Appere, Bowie
Akin Odimayo, Ali Koiki and Jack Sowerby on the bench tonight although all three will have their minutes limited.
No McWilliams after he limped off on Saturday. Hoskins also absent, as are Guthrie, McGowan, Fox, Magloire, Hylton, Haynes and Monthé.
The trialists involved tonight are the same ones who played on Saturday aside from one .
McWilliams and Hoskins not involved tonight purely as a precaution. Both have trained in the last couple of days and should feature at the weekend.
Sam Sherring wears the captain’s armband in the absence of those two plus Guthrie and McGowan.
Think Cobblers will be 4-3-3 tonight. Something like this....
Dadge
Trialist C Sherring Dyche Brough
Trialist E Hondermarck
Pinnock Trialist B Appere
Bowie