Why Doncaster Rovers elected to postpone Shrewsbury Town clash

An injury to Reece James was the main driving force behind Doncaster Rovers’ decision to postpone their clash with Shrewsbury Town, Darren Moore has revealed.
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Rovers have exercised an option in EFL regulations which permits them to postpone Saturday’s scheduled game due to having seen three players called up for international duty.

Despite the absence of Josef Bursik, Danny Amos and Tyreece John-Jules, Darren Moore insists he was intent on Rovers playing the fixture this weekend.

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However, James suffered a knee injury in the defeat to Wigan Athletic which would have made him doubtful for Saturday.

Reece JamesReece James
Reece James

With Jason Lokilo and Rayhaan Tulloch also sidelined through injury, and Rovers facing an EFL Trophy clash with Oldham Athletic on Tuesday, Moore was not willing to risk his side being too short of numbers for the match with the Shrews.

“I was desperate to play the game,” Moore told the Free Press. “We took every precaution and checked on Reece on Sunday.

“Our intention was clear to play the game, without a doubt and keep the momentum and the continuity going.

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“Sometimes these things are taken out of your hands and the next best thing you can do is consider everything.

“We’ve got a squad and a group of players but anything could happen at Oldham.

“We’d have missed the deadline for calling it off and we’d have kicked ourselves if something did happen.

“The intention was to play the game and had Reece come through fit and well then we wouldn’t be talking like this and we’d be looking forward to another game at the weekend.

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“As it is, I’ve had to take that measure to call the game off.

“We regroup again and we continue to work extremely hard. We can put some workload into the players because when we do resume the league programme against Portsmouth, it will be a busy few months.”

Moore says left back James would only have been rated 50-50 to be available for Saturday if the Shrewsbury game was to go ahead but is confident he will be available to face Portsmouth next week.

“Reece got a knock on his patella which has inflamed and caused a bit of swelling around his knee,” he said.

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