Home
Paddy McCarthy’s season may be over at Wanderers thanks to a foot injury sustained in Saturday’s 2-2 draw at Brentford.
The Irish defender has travelled back to Crystal Palace for treatment and now looks certain to miss Monday’s game at Bournemouth.
Neil Lennon had hoped at the weekend the problem would not be a serious one but is now resigned to losing the 31-year-old Dubliner for at least another week.
Whether that means the end of McCarthy’s association with the Whites is another question.
The centre-half is the kind of experienced head Lennon is looking for and has impressed in his five appearances since coming in from Selhurst Park.
The suggestion from Palace is that he would be available for transfer in the summer for a minimal fee but in order to do so, space may well have to be cleared in the existing defensive ranks.
It appears that the majority of Lennon’s summer budget will be spent on a defence which has conceded 63 goals in the Championship this season, and more in injury time than anyone else.
The Whites boss is trying to convince skipper Matt Mills to stay at the Macron next season but admits he expects some “to-ing and fro-ing” between now and the summer, suggesting it could be on reduced terms.
David Wheater and Dorian Dervite are under contract, while the manager’s public interest in a specialist left-back hints that Tim Ream could be moved back into his preferred centre-back spot, or perhaps as a holding midfielder.
It is all food for thought for Lennon over a longer summer spell than he has grown accustomed to north of the border.
“I’ll find it strange the length of close season we are going to have,” he told The Bolton News. “We finish on May 2, so, we will have the whole of May and probably first three weeks in June before we get going again.
“I am not used to that. At Celtic we had a three-week break and it was back to the Champions League qualifiers. So, I am a bit concerned about the length of the break we’ll have.”
The first hint at Wanderers’ pre-season schedule was made yesterday as Welsh club Colwyn Bay announced a friendly on Saturday, July 18. It has not yet been confirmed whether it will be a first-team fixture but will, according to the Llanelian Road side, feature a “strong senior team, including first-teamers.”
Lennon is unlikely to take an extended break as he tries to put his own mark on a team he feels can push much higher up the table next season.
“I will get a holiday but I will be busy because how I use that time it is going to be pivotal in how we go about next season.
“We have to get better and I think there is real potential here to get better.
"This is a big club and if we get the right players in, I think we could be a decent team next season."
Source
The Irish defender has travelled back to Crystal Palace for treatment and now looks certain to miss Monday’s game at Bournemouth.
Neil Lennon had hoped at the weekend the problem would not be a serious one but is now resigned to losing the 31-year-old Dubliner for at least another week.
Whether that means the end of McCarthy’s association with the Whites is another question.
The centre-half is the kind of experienced head Lennon is looking for and has impressed in his five appearances since coming in from Selhurst Park.
The suggestion from Palace is that he would be available for transfer in the summer for a minimal fee but in order to do so, space may well have to be cleared in the existing defensive ranks.
It appears that the majority of Lennon’s summer budget will be spent on a defence which has conceded 63 goals in the Championship this season, and more in injury time than anyone else.
The Whites boss is trying to convince skipper Matt Mills to stay at the Macron next season but admits he expects some “to-ing and fro-ing” between now and the summer, suggesting it could be on reduced terms.
David Wheater and Dorian Dervite are under contract, while the manager’s public interest in a specialist left-back hints that Tim Ream could be moved back into his preferred centre-back spot, or perhaps as a holding midfielder.
It is all food for thought for Lennon over a longer summer spell than he has grown accustomed to north of the border.
“I’ll find it strange the length of close season we are going to have,” he told The Bolton News. “We finish on May 2, so, we will have the whole of May and probably first three weeks in June before we get going again.
“I am not used to that. At Celtic we had a three-week break and it was back to the Champions League qualifiers. So, I am a bit concerned about the length of the break we’ll have.”
The first hint at Wanderers’ pre-season schedule was made yesterday as Welsh club Colwyn Bay announced a friendly on Saturday, July 18. It has not yet been confirmed whether it will be a first-team fixture but will, according to the Llanelian Road side, feature a “strong senior team, including first-teamers.”
Lennon is unlikely to take an extended break as he tries to put his own mark on a team he feels can push much higher up the table next season.
“I will get a holiday but I will be busy because how I use that time it is going to be pivotal in how we go about next season.
“We have to get better and I think there is real potential here to get better.
"This is a big club and if we get the right players in, I think we could be a decent team next season."
Source