Why Doncaster Rovers' midweek bounce game pleased Grant McCann amid empty injury room

Rovers are benefitting from a virtually empty treatment room right now. With no midweek league or cup pencilled in, McCann organised a bounce game against an unnamed fellow League One side on Tuesday afternoon. Joe Sbarra scored twice with Brandon Hanlan also finding the scoresheet in the Cantley Park exercise.

Confirming to the Free Press that the fixture took the shape of two, 30-minute matches McCann reflected: "It was a good performance and it was important that we got some minutes into some of the boys.

"A lot of players played: Jack Senior, Jay McGrath, Tom Nixon, Charlie Crew, Robbie Gotts, Sbarra, Hanlan, Toyosi (Olusanya), Damola Ajayi.

"They did well. It was a pleasing sort of training game - that's what we called it really. We need them to go Saturday-Tuesday-Saturday so they need to be ready when called upon.

"The reason we did two half-hour games was because we wanted all the players to train fully on Thursday. Because sometimes when you play a full 90-minute game Tuesday the day after the day off can sometimes be difficult for them to get out there. But everyone trained as normal today so they're all good for the weekend (Barnsley at home)."

The midweek outing for Nixon will have particularly pleased McCann, especially with first-choice right-back Jamie Sterry still carefully managing his return. The vice-captain has been absent since the September trip to Luton with a shoulder injury but is now back out on the grass. McCann re-iterated however that the plan is to bring him back into the fold for next Tuesday's EFL Trophy game against Bradford City.

"That's the plan," McCann added: "Don't get me wrong, if I asked Jamie to play Saturday he would do but we've got to make sure when he gets back that he stays back.

"It's been a disappointing start to the season for him with things he couldn't control so we're looking forward to having him back and keeping him back."