Gary McSheffrey gives update on Doncaster Rovers' trialists after ex-Sunderland defender checks in
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The Rovers boss handed starts to ex-Sunderland left-back Cieran Dunne and an unnamed midfielder as his side opened their pre-season campaign with a 2-0 win over Armthorpe Welfare on Saturday.
“They did alright,” a coy McSheffrey said of their performances.
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Hide Ad"We’ve got another couple of trialists in the building that didn’t quite make today’s game because they’re just not quite to the fitness levels for a match.
"There’s a few we’re still looking at for another week or so and we’ll keep monitoring things.”
McSheffrey, who has lost Tom Anderson, Aidan Barlow and Kyle Knoyle to injury since the start of pre-season, added: “Priorities change daily.
"If you get the odd knock here or there, or someone gets an unfortunate injury, you might get a different priority.
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Hide Ad"We don’t just want to rush into things where we can’t do anything if something crops up.”
Rossington Main midfielder Bailey Conway, aged 19, remains on trial with Doncaster but picked up a knee injury in training.
McSheffrey said: "It’s the first time Bailey has probably done 10 days of solid training with only a Sunday off in between.
"He was looking pretty good, but he’ll still be around the building and we’ll treat the injury and hope he gets back soon.”
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Hide AdNew signing George Miller caught the eye for Rovers following his second-half introduction against the Wellie and took just six minutes to get on the score sheet.
Second-year scholar Jack Goodman doubled Rovers’ lead late on – but not before a spell of pressure from the home side, who saw an effort cleared off the line following a goalmouth scramble.
On the game, which saw Doncaster use 21 different players, McSheffrey said: “In the first half the performance was a bit sloppy, a bit scrappy.
"There were some good individual performances; Liam Ravenhill I thought was superb throughout, standout player.
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Hide Ad"Second half, we got a goal at a good time. George came on and we looked better with him and Rio [Griffiths] up there. To be fair, the kids saw the game out well for us.”
Nine second-year scholars were given a run-out in the second period – just 24 hours after they returned for pre-season training.