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Club News

Sam Ricketts Pre MK Dons

7 August 2019

Town are on their travels this Saturday with a Sky Bet League One trip to MK Dons.

It should be a good test for Town at Stadium MK in what is MK Dons first game of the season following the postponement of their opening game with Bury.

Town got the season off to a great start with a deserved win at home to Portsmouth, thanks to a wonder strike from Ryan Giles.

Town manager Sam Ricketts spoke to the press this morning to give his thoughts ahead of MK Dons.

"I've studied the Portsmouth game and my thoughts are pretty the same now as they were at the end of the game", said Sam.

"I'm delighted with the win as that is the be-all and end-all, loads of things to work on, loads of good things, things where we need to get better but ultimately you can't grumble with winning the first game of the season."

Saturday sees Town make the trip to Stadium MK in what will be MK Dons opening game of the Sky Bet League One season.

"It puts us a bit of a disadvantage as I'm sure they would have had someone watching our game while we haven't been able to watch them", said Sam.

"They are starting a week later but they will be excited, their first game after getting promoted, playing at home and they are a good team.

"They like to play football, really expansive football as well so we will need to be ready and try to carry that little bit of momentum that we are generating."

Stadium MK is one of the better stadiums in the Sky Bet League One and the size of the pitch will suit the way Town try to play.

"It is a fantastic stadium, very nice and big and I'm sure the pitch will be nice this time of year", said Sam.

"It is a very good venue to play football that's for sure."

MK Dons got automatic promotion from Sky Bet League Two last season being pipped to second place by Bury on goal different. That momentum will make them a tough opposition but they have also recruited well.

"It's not just the momentum of promotion which will help them, they have good really good financial backing", said Sam.

"They have invested again this summer and sides like that with momentum and the finical backing to add to their squad gives them a possibility in this league."

To finish with we asked Sam for a quick update on the injury situation and there was good news for Abo Eisa, but disappointment for Josh Laurent.

"Eisa will be back in for the weekend after taking that knock to his head against Portsmouth, he wanted to come back on but the new concussion protocols meant we couldn't allow him to", said Sam.

"Unfortunately Josh Laurent got injured picking up a muscle problem in the game which is frustrating.

"We are assessing him at the moment and it's a shame as he did really well for us then he came on.

"There are a few other bits picked up in training already so we will have to monitor those over the next couple of days.

"Ollie Norburn is probably three to four weeks away and then hopefully we will get him back, and that will be like a new signing."


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