Blackburn Rovers boss Valerien Ismael delivers ‘positive’ early injury update ahead of Sunderland clash
Blackburn Rovers boss Valerien Ismael has delivered an early team news update ahead of his side’s Championship clash with Sunderland on Easter Monday.
The Black Cats host Rovers at the Stadium of Light next week, with both sides also having fixtures to contend with a few days prior on Good Friday. For Sunderland, that means a lengthy trip to Bristol City, while Ismael’s men will host Millwall at Ewood Park.
And speaking in a pre-match press conference ahead of that clash, the Frenchman delivered a detailed update on the status of his squad.
What has Blackburn Rovers boss Valerien Ismael said about his squad ahead of Sunderland clash?
Rovers are facing a largely promising prognosis heading into their trip to Wearside, with Ismael suggesting that both Japanese international Yuki Ohashi, who has scored in each of his last two outings, and winger Ryan Hedges could be available.
He said: “We will assess Yuki and we will assess Hedges. At the moment, it looks good for both players. It looks positive, there are some good signs that Yuki will be ready, but I have to be careful with my optimism! I think he has a good chance to be there.
“We may have some players coming back into the squad and we will see. We still have time to assess the players but at least we’re not losing players with injuries.”
Elsewhere, Ismael provided an update on full-back Callum Brittain, adding: “Callum is really close to being back and he’s been good training with the team.
“With [Emmanuel] Dennis, I think this week is a little too early for him to be back, [Augustus] Kargbo is the same as well. It’s also too early for Hayden [Carter], so we’re still missing a lot of players.”
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What has Regis Le Bris said about Sunderland’s team news ahead of Blackburn Rovers clash?
In a press conference of his own on Wednesday, Sunderland head coach Regis Le Bris provided updates on a number of key players. He said: “Jobe [Bellingham] will be available [against Bristol City], he probably won’t be a starter at Bristol but he will be available.
“It was important for him to recover properly. Dennis [Cirkin]will hopefully be back on Monday [for Blackburn]. I don’t think he will be a starter but we will see if we can give him a short period of time off the bench. We will see on that one. Leo [Hjelde] is [fully] available again. Salis [Abdul Samed] is back. A little bit later we will Dan Ballard back in training.”
He added: “Enzo [Le Fée] I think is okay now. We know that he can really help the team because he is a very talented player, and well connected with the team. We didn’t want to rush the process, maybe he could have started against Swansea and the output of the game would have been different, but we want to build gradually and this was the right decision.”
