Harrogate Railway's injury crisis eases slightly ahead of play-off clash with Horbury Town

With the NCEL Division One play-offs just around the corner, the Starbeck club have been missing six first-team regulars in recent weeks, though hope to have three of them back for Saturday's clash with Horbury Town.

Striker Albert Ibrahimi and central midfielders Jack Lazenby and Andrew Shepherd have all damaged anterior cruciate ligaments and face an extended period on the sidelines.

Rail skipper Dan McDaid (back) and forward Lewis Walters (hamstring) find themselves in a race against time to be fit for this weekend’s play-off semi-final clash, though striker Luke Stewart (foot) should be fine having come through Wednesday night’s win over champions Campion unscathed.

Unsurprisingly, the absence of so many of their most influential players has been reflected in results, with Mick O’Connell’s men failing to win in three matches prior to their midweek success.

That run of form ended any lingering hopes of beating Campion to the title, and also saw them overtaken by Rossington Main and drop to third place in the table prior to Wednesday’s victory.

But boss O’Connell says that he just had to make his peace with a situation that is beyond his control.

"Looking from the outside, I’m sure it will just look like we have just dropped off in terms of our performances, but the reality is that injuries have absolutely killed us,” the Irishman explained.

"Three players suffering ACL injuries in the space of four weeks is unheard of. You couldn’t make it up. And then with three more also out at the same time, it’s made things really difficult.

"I don't like to hide behind excuses, but that’s more than 50 percent of my starting line-up unavailable, plus my goalkeeper has been playing through injury and Sean Hunter has also been struggling. With that many missing all at once, of course you are going to struggle.

"To be fair to the lads who have been playing, they’ve been performing pretty well, we just haven’t had a number nine to put away the chances we have been creating.

"We’ve not been in a position to bring anyone in, so we’ve had to try and look after a few with the play-offs in mind because that’s the priority now and hopefully we’ll have one or two fit in time for Saturday.”

Railway’s win at Campion on Wednesday lifted them back up to second place in the table and means that they will host sixth-placed Horbury rather than Wakefield (5th) in this Saturday’s play-off semi-final.

"It’s going to be a tough match, but we are now just two one-off games away from achieving the promotion that we’ve been aiming for,” O’Connell added.

"The main goal at the start of the season was to finish in the play-offs again. Our next goal is to repeat last year’s achievement of making the play-off final. If we can do that, then there is just 90 minutes between us and a place in the division above.

"We’ve rested lads, we’ve tried to manage the minutes of some players to make sure we are in the best position we can be come Saturday.

"Luke Stewart got some useful minutes on Wednesday, as did Sean Hunter, and they should be okay as long as they comes through training. Lewis Walters is the same and has a chance. Dan McDaid, who is our captain and a real leader, he might be able to train later this week, so there’s a possibility we might have him back, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

"We’ve done everything we can to try and give ourselves the best possible opportunity this weekend.”

Saturday’s clash with Horbury, whom Railway beat 2-1 at home during the regular season courtesy of McDaid’s late, late winner, kicks-off at Station View at 3pm.

"Horbury are more of a counter-attacking side, they have some pace going forward and a very good centre-forward,”

“It should be a good match-up. Last time we played them at home they kept 10 men behind the ball and it took until the 96th minute to break them down.

“So, we have trained with two plans in mind, one for if they keep numbers behind the ball and one for if they look to open up and have a go. We’ll do our analysis and get plenty of tactical information into the lads.”