Alex Neil is hoping to get “two or three” key players back during a well-deserved two-week rest period after Stoke City were beaten 2-0 by injury-plagued leaders Leicester.
Stoke were without 10 players – and only two fit defenders – in perhaps the toughest game of the Championship season and were picked by Kelechi Iheanacho and Jamie Vardy.
But Andre Vidigal returned to the team as an unused substitute while Emre Tezgel returned from injury with a goal for the Under-18s, where he is working on his fitness.
Ryan Mmaee (hamstring), Lynden Gooch (hamstring) and Michael Rose (groin) hope it won’t be too long, while there will hopefully be updates on Enda Stevens, Tyrese Campbell, Ben Wilmot and Ki-Jana Hoever .
It is light at the end of the tunnel for Stoke, who have had seven games to play in three weeks since the last international break.
“I hope so,” Neil said.
“I think we can get two or three goals back.
I was thinking about Andre in that match, but I thought as the match went on there was no point in risking him at that point because it would have been very difficult for us to get through.
return.
I won’t get anything out of the match.
There was no point in me risking them at this stage, which is why I left him on the bench.
He added:
“We played a lot of games:
Seven games in 21 days, it’s ridiculous.
We’ve lost eight members of the first team who are senior players, we’ve got a back row with a kid playing in only his second game after leaving League Two a few weeks ago and we’ve got Luke McNally who has played 25 league games as a player.
centre-back, and then we have midfielders scattered in the back line.
“So this was a real challenge for us.
We knew it was going to be a difficult task, but in terms of the effort of the players and their application and how they performed , I think they gave us everything they could.
“