St Mirren boss Stephen Robinson faces an injury crisis for the visit of Ross County in the cinch Premiership on Saturday.
Defender Richard Tait (groin) and striker Jonah Ayunga (knee) were already out long term, while striker Alex Greive will be sidelined for three to four weeks with an ankle problem that saw him miss the midweek defeat at Motherwell.
Scott Tanser is waiting to see the extent of his hamstring injury, while Alex Gogic, Keanu Baccus and Curtis Main are all “very, very doubtful” with various injuries for the game against the second-bottom Staggies.
The Buddies squad was depleted during the transfer window when first-team regular Ethan Erhahon moved to Lincoln and 17-year-old Dylan Reid signed for Crystal Palace, while striker Eamonn Brophy joined Ross County on loan and Toyosi Olusanya signed a loan deal with Arbroath.
Robinson is set to have seven teenagers, who have yet to make their first-team debut, on the bench.
He said: “We can’t get a scan (on Tanser) until Tuesday but it doesn’t look promising at the moment.
“Alex Gogic is very, very doubtful for the game, Keanu Baccus is very, very doubtful for the game and Curtis Main is very, very doubtful for the game so you can see where I am going with (this), the squad is going to be tested to the absolute limit.
“We knew that when – under the financial circumstances – we had to move people on during the window, we were going to be pushed if we got injuries and unfortunately, they have all come at the same time.
“I have a lot of belief in the younger players.
“Are they ready to go in and be a top-six side? No, of course they are not. We haven’t given them that game time yet but there’s players in the building waiting on chances. Players with real experience waiting for chances and I have belief in them as well.
“Do we have the depth that we want to kick on or make changes during games?
“Any team that potentially has six or seven starters potentially out – even the top teams – are going to find that a difficult situation.
“But I am not in the habit of making excuses. We deal with it, we get on with it, we make the very best of it and we will put out a very competitive team.”
One silver lining was the prognosis of Greive, with Robinson saying: “It is probably the only positive news we have had on the injury front to be honest.
“We are hoping it will not be quite so serious but it will still be three weeks. We were fearing it could maybe be an end-of-season job.
“But we are looking at three to four weeks with Alex. So that is a huge boost for us considering we don’t have loads and loads of options.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel