We spoke to manager Paul Simpson this week to get his thoughts on the Rangers friendly on Monday.
“The Rangers game was a really good workout,” he said. “Seeing the way that the players worked, you can still see that they wanted to be a part of it.
“I felt it was a real good runout for them, it showed that we need more of those games. It was a good workout and hopefully they will all be better for that 90 minutes of football.
“I thought the attitude was spot on, which again gives me real hope that they are all still pulling in the same direction, that’s what we’ve got to do because we all need to be united together, we have to get that unity in us, if we do that, we train well Monday to Friday.”
“If they are not in the side, then they have to be pushing the lads who are in the side, they have to be making the standards high and making them good.”
“On Monday we could see they are still in it and want to be involved, we just have to get it right starting on Saturday.
“The most pleasing thing for me was that it was a massive improvement on some of the other games that we've had in that type of fixture. We’ve had some quite low performances, when I think of Middlesbrough and Blackburn in those games that we played. But I thought the attitude of the players was excellent that day.
“The bulk of it is around getting match minutes and getting fitness out of it. But I thought there were some real positive performances out of it. It was good to see everybody performing again.
"It was actually good for me to get there because these other games that we've had, the way the kick off times have been, I've not been able to get there. Thankfully I was able to get to Rangers, and see what they're all about and I thought they applied themselves really well.”
And on the current injury situation, he said: “Sean Maguire is back in training now, he had a couple of injections, the scan showed there was no damage that needed any surgery or any time away, we’re just managing that with painkillers at the moment. He's trained fully this week, so he's okay.
“Jack Diamond is one who we have nursed through this week, there's definitely improvements from shutting him down. We're hopeful that he'll be fit for the weekend. We're just going have to wait and see. He desperately wants to be fit, he's certainly not saying I want to come out of it. He wants to be involved and he wants to play. So hopefully he’ll be fine for the weekend.
“At the moment JJ [Kayode] is back at Rotherham, and he's being managed by them at this moment in time. We're just going to have to sort of wait and see. We've had him since end of August and we've had two games out of him, none of them 90 minutes. We're as disappointed as he is and as frustrated with it, but we would like to try and get him back. And we've just got to wait and see how that goes.
“Josh [Emmanuel] is hoping to be signed off for his return to full training early next week with a view to join in from next week.
“We’ve got a few other bumps and bruises from the Cambridge game, hopefully they will be ok for the weekend, we will just wait and see nearer the time.”
