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U’s Down To Bare Bones

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The U’s travel to Coventry City this Sunday and look set to be up against it from the off with a number of injury concerns surrounding the squad after last night’s defeat to Dagenham.

Joe Dunne’s side bowed out of the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy at the first attempt last night with a resounding 4-1 defeat to the League Two strugglers.

Magnus Okuonghae saw red in the second half for a second bookable offence and, from there, the game went downhill for the U’s. But, worse than that, a number of injury worries have also arisen.

Freddie Sears, Drey Wright and Sanchez Watt all sat the game out with knocks that had been picked up beforehand and, along with Magnus now missing for the weekend, others are doubts too.

‘Ryan Dickson has been physically sick at half-time,’ Dunne told BBC Essex after the game. ‘Brian Wilson was struggling with his calf and we also got the hamstring injury to Gavin Massey.

‘I planned to bring Josh Thompson on at half-time but we ran out of options and we were ragged in the second half. So it’s a bad night and we’re very thin on the ground.’

The transfer window for loan signings re-opens next week after the deadline day for permanent signings passed us by on Monday, and Dunne suggested that he may be forced to venture into the market.

A whole host of loan signings last season proved a hit for the U’s in the quest for survival, but despite looking like he may need to dip in now, he insists that the squad is better than before.

‘We may need to look in the window next week to see if we can help out the squad a bit,’ he revealed. ‘But we have a good squad, better than last year, with some injured players in the stand so we’ll get them fit and see how we go.

‘We’ll have to regroup and see who we can get out at Coventry as we have six or seven injured which takes us into our U21s. We’ll lick our wounds, take it on the chin and go again.’


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