Boston United could welcome trio back from injury but midfielder needs operation

Paul Cox is hoping a trio of Boston United's injured players could be back in contention for Saturday's arrival of Southport.

However, midfielder Paul Green looks to be another month away from returning.

Jake Wright jnr, who has been nursing a hamstring injury while serving a three-match ban, and striker James Hanson, who is also yet to feature under the new Pilgrims boss, could be in contention for a place in the squad this weekend.

Jay Rollins, who has yet to feature this season after picking up a knee injury in pre-season, could also force his way into Cox's plans.

However, former Leeds United and Derby County man Green has suffered a setback to the shoulder injury he picked up at Spennymoor Town last month.

"Greeny's due an operation on his shoulder so that's going to be about four weeks," Cox said.

"But James Hanson's got a chance, Jake Wright jnr's got a chance and Jay Rollins has got a chance."

For Cox, however, overcoming injury is only half the problem. The United boss also wants his players to reach the right levels of match fitness to play the style of football he wants.

He added: "We've got a number of players that can be very effective at this level of football. It's just how fast we get them up to match speed.

"The boys are fit to come on, but they've got to be fit for high intensity running for 90 minutes as that's how we want to play.

"How quickly we can get them there, that's key."

Scott Garner returned to the side during Saturday's 2-1 defeat at Hereford after sitting out of the previous nine matches.

But after replacing Keenan Ferguson in a tactical swap, Cox was pleased with the how the defender looked on the turf.

"To be fair to Garns, I thought he was excellent when he came back on Saturday," Cox continued.

"He's everything I want from a central defender. It was good that so soon after coming back he was going into the mix and I thought the back four in general, from the minute we changed shape, looked a lot more solid."

Tuesday's Lincolnshire Senior Cup semi-final at Gainsborough Trinity will be viewed as a chance to help get some players up to speed, while swapping training from a Monday evening to a Tuesday is another way the manager hopes to get more from his players - after giving them an additional rest day from the weekend.

"We've tweaked the training to go back to a Tuesday," Cox added.

"Where we think we can get more out of them with the high intensity stuff.

"We've laid some good foundations for the business end of the season."

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