Luton midfielder available for Burton clash after recovering from shoulder injury

Luton midfielder Liam Walsh is available for tomorrow’s home match against Burton Albion after recovering from a shoulder injury which has kept him out for the last four games.

The 28-year-old had been an important part of manager Jack Wilshere’s first team plans since he took over, starting 15 successive League One matches for the boss following the 3-0 victory at Stockport County in early November, with four assists to his name, before he missed the 1-0 victory over Blackpool at Kenilworth Road last month and had been absent since.

Having suffered from shoulder issues when previous boss Matt Bloomfield was in charge, which saw him missing for six games, then Wilshere knew he had to take extra care in his recovery this time, as he said: “He’s back training, so he’ll be available. He hasn’t trained much so I have to take that into consideration, but he’s back. He had an infection which wasn’t great for him and he struggled with that to recover, but he also picked up a knock in that game (1-0 loss to Huddersfield), nothing serious, nothing bad.

"We had to just wait probably about 10 days in the end when he couldn’t have that much contact, so then we have to build him back up, but he’s back training now, so we’re happy with that. It’s nothing serious and Walshy is the type of person, type of player who just wants to play, and he was frustrated with it, but we have to be careful. He’s had a problem there before so we have to look after him a little bit.”

There was also good news for summer signing Hakeem Odoffin who has been out since coming off the bench for the 4-0 victory over Wycombe Wanderers on Boxing Day. Although he might not be able to play against Burton at the weekend, there is every chance he could feature when Town host Plymouth Argyle in the Vertu Trophy on Tuesday night, as Wilshere continued: “Haks trained for the first time fully today, which is good.

"He’s been around the group, stepping in, stepping out of training, topping up his fitness and again that was someone we had to be really careful with as he’s had a problem there before. It’s easy to rush that type of player and character back as he’s so important for the group and we have to manage him. He’s back fully training and he has to build his minutes up, but he’s back with us. It (tomorrow) might be a bit early as it’s his first proper training session today, but he’s not far away.”

However, deadline day addition Sverre Sandal is still not expected to be available to make his debut yet after joining on a permanent deal from Norwegian top flight club KFUM, as Wilshere added: “He’s still building it up. He picked up a little bit of a knock, nothing bad, it set him back probably a week or so now, so he’s building up his fitness with the fitness staff. Hopefully it won’t be too long before he steps back into training, but then again we have to build his minutes up as well as he hasn’t played since November, so he’s not ready yet and he’ll probably be a little while yet.”