Key Cobblers players still missing for Oldham showdown

Junior Morias, Ash Taylor, Shay Facey, Leon Barnett and Dean Bowditch have all been sidelined in recent weeks, and although boss Keith Curle says all are progressing in their rehabilitation he wouldn’t confirm if any will be back for the weekend.

“Junior is field based in his rehab, and I think two or three of the players are now field based and we are hoping they will soon be back,” said the Town boss.

It has been a feature of Curle’s pre-match press conferences to date that he is not keen on talking about injured players, and he has expanded on his reasoning for that, stating that he doesn’t want players even out on the training pitch unless they are 100 per cent ready to play.

“Nacho (head physio, Ignacio Herrando) would be able to explain fully where all the players are, but I don’t like putting timetables on players,” said the Town boss.

“We have a fantastic medical department and strength and conditioning department who do a lot of hard work with the players.

“It is a case of when they are ready to hand them over to me, and they will have the final say because ultimately, if they are not ready, then they are the ones being called into the office for me to ask ‘why are you sending me a player that is not physically ready?’

“When I introduce players into training they have got to be ready to hit the ground running.

“The tempo that we train at, the players have got to be able to do that.”