Calf injury rules Town defender out for a couple of weeks

Hatters boss Jack Wilshere has revealed club captain Kal Naismith will be missing for a few weeks after he suffered a calf injury during Tuesday night’s 1-1 draw at Huddersfield Town.

The 34-year-old had only recently been restored to the starting line-up after a spell out of the team, as having been on the bench for four matches, was recalled for the 4-1 victory at Wycombe Wanderers. Impressing during the contest at Adams Park, Naismith then kept his spot for the next four fixtures, until he missed Saturday’s 2-0 win at Peterborough United due to illness, Joe Johnson getting the nod instead.

Having recovered from the sickness that had affected several players at Kenilworth Road, Naismith was straight back into the side for the trip to Yorkshire in midweek, but lasted around a quarter of an hour, before signalling his evening was over and came off, on-loan Newcastle United defender Harrison Ashby coming on instead of Johnson and moving to right back, as Izzy Jones swapped to the left.

With Town having an FA Cup clash tomorrow and are then not in league action until November 21 when they travel to Burton Albion, with a Jersey Mike’s Trophy tie against Peterborough United in between, asked for an update, Wilshere said: “Kal’s got a calf injury, so he’ll be out for a couple of weeks, so pobably the international break’s comes at a good time for that.

"It was a little bit frustrating for Kal, for me, because I feel like with Kal, when you’ve got him in that rhythm and he’s playing games, playing games, playing games, he’s really important with his leadership and how he’s been playing recently. You kind of want to keep that going, and he missed out against Peterborough, through illness which then kind of breaks his rhythm, and we had a decision to make on Tuesday whether we bring him back in.

"I thought it was important for the team that we bring him back in, also giving the context that JJ played his first 90 minutes against Peterborough and was understandably a little bit fatigued. That’s why after 10 minutes when Kal went down, we had another decision to make around JJ, was it JJ or was it going to be Harrison, who didn’t play as long on Saturday, and that’s why we made that decision.”

The fact that Naismith, as Nahki Wells did against Doncaster Rovers a few games earlier, went off immediately rather than trying to play on, was applauded by Wilshere too, who added: “It’s important and I think it’s something that we can learn from and also the message to players is always that. We don’t want players, if they feel something, to think they have to push through. We need to be aware of it because hopefully it doesn’t make it any worse.”