Updates from John Still on the Hatters' walking wounded
On Alex Lawless: “Alex Lawless not quite ready. He’s had a slight little thing with his groin and he’s been out a little while and that’s to be expected but it’s not terrible.
“He’s a very good player, but it’s important that he plays when he’s fit. He hasn’t got a problem with his fitness, in terms of being bodily fit, but he’s had a slight problem with his groin.
“Because he’s been out and he’s just come back and played a couple of games those are the sort or things you get, but it’s nothing that’s going to keep him out for long. It’s nothing that’s going to set him back. What I’m saying is I would think he’ll be training next week and he wouldn’t have lost the things he’s picked up in the last couple of weeks.”
On Solomon Taiwo: “He’s not quite going to be ready, he’s got a very slight hamstring, but with two games at the weekend we won’t go with that.”
On the midfield choices: “We’ve got a few options and we’ve explored those options this week. So we’ll have a final look tomorrow (Friday), but with Ronnie Henry coming back, obviously Jonathan Smith it gives him maybe an opportunity.
“Andy Parry’s done really, really well in the development game, really well, so that’s another way to go.
“I wasn’t looking to push, push the younger players at this stage of the season, but gradually introduce them, but he’s done very well so that’s a possibility as well.”
On defender Anthony Charles, out with a shoulder injury sustained against Salisbury: “They said four to six weeks, I think and that’s what it’s going to be, four to six weeks. It’s been two weeks now so that won’t change.”
On defender Danny Fitzsimons’ knee injury: “Danny got injured when we were in Portugal and he’s got injured again when he played a development game against Peterborough. When he got injured the first time, he said ‘I’ve never been injured in my life’ – and he’s injured again. I think another three or four weeks for that as well.”
On striker Alex Wall, who has been missing with a virus: “It’s a really weird one because he trained really fantastically and this has been a little bit of a blow to us to be honest because he was looking fantastic.
“When we went away to Portugal he was looking fit and strong and incredibly powerful, but he picked up some sort of virus, some sort of bug, and it’s really affected him. We’ve done all sorts of tests. We actually think we’ve got to the bottom of what might be causing the problem and we’re trying to deal with it at the moment.
“Fortunately it’s the time of the season where if it takes two or three more weeks gradually we can get him into it.
“He’s training without training full out. He’s trying to tick over to keep his core fitness which he’s got. He missed the games, but he could still do some training so we’ve been able to maintain a reasonable level of fitness, but we need to get this problem sorted out first, but we’ve had test, after test, after test. They think they’ve got to the bottom of it but he’s going somewhere tomorrow that we hope can come up with the remedy for what he’s got. It might shooting!”