Fanne and Nelson to come back into contention for Luton against Portsmouth
Midfield duo could be in the squad to face Pompey
Hatters midfielder Lamine Fanne is expected to be recalled to the Hatters’ match-day squad for this afternoon’s crunch relegation fixture against Portsmouth at Kenilworth Road.
The 21-year-old moved to Bedfordshire from Swedish top-flight club AIK in January having officially joined in the summer only to stay and complete the season with the Allsvenskan outfit. Making two starts against QPR and Nottingham Forest in an unusual attacking role, Fanne then picked up an ankle injury at the City Ground which saw him absent when Bloomfield took over.
He then began the 1-1 draw at Sheffield Wednesday, where playing his more accustomed holding role, he turned in an impressive display, before also beginning the 2-0 loss to Sunderland, his error pounced upon by the Black Cats for their second goal early after the break. With Bloomfield making seven changes against Sheffield United, Fanne was not only dropped, but missed out on the squad completely, not involved against Plymouth and Watford either.
However, with the news that Shandon Baptiste and Marvelous Nakamba are both now out for six weeks with calf injuries, when the Spanish born player and Town academy graduate Zack Nelson could well be involved once more, as speaking yesterday, Bloomfield said: “He’s (Fanne) a young player who’s learning the game and he’s someone we think extremely highly of.
"We need to, as we spoke about a couple of times, with Christ (Makosso), with Reuell (Walters), with Zack, with Joe (Johnson), we’ve got lots of young player and we’re not in a position now to be using them all at the same time as it’s a time for experience and know-how to get ourselves out of where we are right now.
"But Lamine will come back into the thinking, Zack will come back into the thinking. Zack I’ve said it a number of times, he’s going to be a top player, he's going to be a real top player. He’s a great boy, Zack, and Lamine, they’ve both worked extremely hard when they’ve not been in the squad and we’ll welcome them back into the squad.”
Discussing just why he had left him recently, Bloomfield had added: “He’s available, he’s been training really, really well. If you look at the teamsheet for the last few games we’ve looked to go with a little bit more experience because of the situation that we’re in. That’s not a derogatory or a negative on him, but its felt like the right thing to put boys in there who have been there, seen it and done it a little bit more.
"We can’t have too many of the young players in the team at the same time. I believe in young players, I want to introduce them as much as we possibly can, but he’s training well, adapting and we hope he can contribute again before the season’s out. He’s going to be a good player for our football club and we believe in him, but it just felt like the right time the last couple of games to go with the mix that we did.”