Forest loanee Fin Back returned to the club this week having recovered from a hamstring injury which required surgery and an extensive period or rehab and recovery with his parent club.
Back, 20, made 18 appearances for the Blues prior to the setback and is back in the fold ahead of the final eight games of the campaign.
“It’s brilliant to see him here with us again,” manager Paul Simpson said. “He’s come back to us and he’s looking fit and strong, and he’s got a sheer determination about him that he wants to be here and make an impact.
“Obviously Fin, if he was to start, the chances are we wouldn’t get 90 minutes out of him, so that’s a decision that needs to be made.”
“Paul Huntington has trained this week as well,” he added. “This morning [Wednesday] we had 26 outfield players who could have been out on the grass, because that’s Taylor Charters doing the first part of his integration back into the group, so we have a big group of players now.
“Within that we have the boys who are out on loan in Scotland and over in the north east, and we also have Josh Dixon who is just returning from injury.
“It is a big group to choose from so there are going to be players who are disappointed because they’re not in the main training group.
“There are players who will be disappointed this weekend that they don’t travel, possibly five or even six of them, but that’s what I want. I want a group of players who go out and finish this last eight games in the right way.
“It isn’t just going to be 11 of them, and it probably isn’t going to be just the same 18, we’re going to need the full group to go out and finish off what we’ve got to now.”
With Jack Ellis also stepping things up, he commented: “Hunts, Jack and Fin are all available for selection and to travel.
“It’s just Taylor Charters out of those I’ve spoken about, and Josh Dixon, who aren’t available at this moment in time.
“Everybody else is, so we have a good group to choose from and hopefully it’s a group that’s got a determination and desire to go and get a result against a team who everybody has been chasing all season.”
“In that area of defence we’ve got good options with Jack Ellis getting fit again now,” he continued. “Joel Senior is getting fitter as he goes on, and Ben Barclay can play the wing back role, so just in that one position we have some good options.
“Hunts coming back gives us that experience again, and the big thing we’ve got to do is get back to scoring. This group has got us 58 goals, and we’ve had a run without scoring, so we need to find a combination of strikers that starts firing, it’s a simple as that.
“If it’s midfield players, strikers, defenders, whatever, we need to start adding to those 58 goals again. The sooner we do that the bigger chance we have of being successful.”
