Harrogate Town captain Josh Falkingham back from injury and determined to meet challenge of 'toughest' League Two campaign head on

The 32-year-old midfielder missed the Sulphurites’ first five League Two fixtures of the season, but returned to action following foot surgery for Saturday’s 4-0 mauling by Newport County.

That appearance was his first in Harrogate colours since March 1 when he was substituted early in the second half of a 1-1 draw at home to Port Vale.

Having initially hoped to be back in time for the final game of last term, Falkingham then suffered another setback, one which required him to have a screw inserted into a metatarsal bone and left him unable to do anything other than some light running during pre-season.

“It’s been a really frustrating time for me,” the former Leeds United midfielder told the Harrogate Advertiser.

“I’ve never had an injury before which has kept me out of action all summer and meant I’ve not been able to properly join in with any of the pre-season training.

“I’ve not been fully in amongst it, if you know what I mean, and I have found that quite difficult.

“It’s been a bit of a strange situation really, and I’m just glad to be able to put it behind me and get back to trying to help the team.”

Of the sequence of events which led to him being ruled out for almost half a year rather than the six weeks he was initially expected to miss, Falkingham explained: “Initially, they found a little stress fracture in the navicular bone in my foot and, looking at the scans, they thought it was from an old injury.

“So I spent the back end of last season out with that and I was in an air cast for about five weeks. I thought I had an outside chance of being back for the last game of the season.

“I came back and I did 10 days of running and was feeling okay. I started to push my workload up and began twisting and turning. Then, just as I went to push off from the side of my foot I felt a really sharp pain.

“It didn’t settle down, so I went back for another scan and this time the fifth metatarsal lit up. They said I could rest it for another five or six weeks and it would heal, but there was a 50/50 chance it would just go again because of the position it was in.

“Or, there was the option to have surgery and put a little screw in the fifth metatarsal, which meant I was out for longer, but there was a 90-95 percent chance of success.”

That procedure successfully completed, Town made a promising start to 2022/23 minus their influential skipper, a player manager Simon Weaver refers to as his “little general”.

They beat Swindon 3-0 on the opening day, taking seven points from their first four matches while keeping three clean-sheets in the process.

Back-to-back defeats to Barrow and Newport have however dropped the Sulphurites down to 18th position in the table, with the manner of Saturday’s first-half capitulation against an Exiles side who failed to win any of their opening four matches a cause for real concern.

And, while Falkingham concedes that the competition in League Two this term will be fiercer than ever before, he insists that he and his team-mates have to use that fact as motivation to improve, rather than being apprehensive about the challenge ahead.

“There are some really big clubs at this level, some really good sides. And, if you look at the recruitment of a lot of teams over the summer, I think it shows you that the competition is going to be fierce,” he continued.

“I believe this season is going to be even tougher than the last two, but the way I look at that, it’s extra motivation. That has to get you going as a player.

“I’m using it as a positive. We’ve got to be even better, we’ve got to work even harder if we want to win games and do well. It’s the opportunity to test ourselves against stronger sides and that’s a challenge we should embrace.

“Before the start of this season, we didn’t have any specific goals set out, but we did find it difficult during the second half of last season and we’re determined to learn from that and make sure that we improve.

“We know from our experience of the last two years that it is a long, hard season in League Two. So we won’t be getting ahead of ourselves, it’s just a case of trying to be better and making sure that we are progressing in the right direction.”

Town return to action on Tuesday evening when they visit Hartlepool United in the EFL Trophy, 7pm kick-off.