Western Daily Press (Saturday)

Clarke and Nicholson facing time on sidelines

- SAM FROST sam.frost@reachplc.com

JOEY Barton had little positive injury news to share at his press conference yesterday, with Bristol Rovers set to be without front men Leon Clarke and Sam Nicholson for lengthy periods.

Barton revealed that Clarke’s hamstring injury is likely to be longterm, forcing the striker out for months, while Nicholson could miss four weeks with a shin problem.

With Trevor Clarke, Alex Rodman and, most likely, Anssi Jaakkola missing for the visit of Leyton Orient this afternoon, too, the manager is light on options.

“Clarkey’s (Leon Clarke) had a bit of a setback,” Barton said. “He came off in the last game. We’re waiting on the full prognosis of that, but it doesn’t look too good.

“He’s in today, big Leon, so we’ll have a chat with him and we’ll have a bit of informatio­n, but it looks like a long-term one as opposed to a shortterm one, so that is a real blow.

“We got 45 minutes from him and he scored a goal and 30 minutes where he looked lively.

“He’s going to miss a significan­t period of time by the looks of it, so I’m really disappoint­ed.”

Barton accepts it was a risk signing the 36-year-old last month, given his recent struggles with injury.

“We knew we were short anyway with the window closing,” Barton added. “Obviously, when you take 36-year-old free agents, it’s a risk, it’s a gamble and Brett (Pitman) is kind of in the same boat.

“You do want 23, 24, 25, 26-yearold players, but they tend to cost a significan­t amount more than the boys on free transfers. We tried our best to get the best available.

“Losing Brandon (Hanlan) was tough because it was late in the window and, as I said at the time, it was always going to be a risk because of the scarcity of that type of player in the marketplac­e.

“Clarkey came in and scored and you’re thinking we’ve got a focal point now to build the attack around, and then 30 minutes into his first start he has to come out of the game injured.

“That is football and Leyton Orient won’t be feeling sorry for us. They will be rubbing their hands together and thinking Saturday is a great opportunit­y to continue their good start to the season.”

Rovers were relieved Nicholson had not suffered a broken shin after being caught by a heavy challenge in the win over Crawley a fortnight ago, but further assessment has found he needs to spend several weeks on the sidelines.

The manager said: “Sammy Nicholson, we had an initial scan which showed he didn’t have a break, but he’s got severe bone bruising, so it’s going to put him out for the better part of a month because you can get stress fractures and stuff like that. That’s another disappoint­ing bit of news.

“Anssi Jaakkola’s had an injection in his Achilles, that’s settling down and he’s on the way back, Trevor Clarke is the same. No real good news on the injury front.”

 ?? Andy Watts/JMP ?? > Leon Clarke will be out of action for some time
Andy Watts/JMP > Leon Clarke will be out of action for some time

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