Sunderland defender still 'weeks' away from return, Tony Mowbray confirms

Sunderland defender Lynden Gooch is still ‘weeks’ away from a return from injury, Tony Mowbray has confirmed.

Gooch has already been out for a month after injuring his hip flexor in the 3-1 defeat to Swansea on January 14.

It was initially expected to be a minor knock, but he has missed the five games since and there is still no sign of anything like an imminent return ahead of Tuesday’s game against QPR.

"Lynden is still going to be out for a few more weeks, he's not on the grass,” Mowbray said. “I haven't seen him out there even with the physios yet.

"Niall [Huggins] also isn't ready yet. He hasn't trained with us.

However, there is a lot more positive news on Dennis Cirkin, who suffered a concussion whilst scoring the equaliser for Sunderland at Millwall.

“Dennis is travelling," said Mowbray. "He has trained for the last few days and he feels alright, so he's back and available."

Despite the hectic schedule Sunderland have at the moment, Mowbray says he doesn’t have the squad to make sweeping changes to his side this week.

He is, though, expecting to make a couple of changes to give some tiring players some extra rest.

"Maybe a few [changes],” Mowbray said when asked about his potential team selection for the QPR game.

“You can't change your whole team - we haven't got the personnel to change the whole team - but there are a few players who are, not underperforming, but not performing at the heights they would be when there's one game a week, when they are sharp, bright, alert.

"I'll probably just try to freshen it up with one or two. It's rotation, and you hope that you don't weaken your team too much when you rotate.

"It's about squad depth, and by that I don't mean numbers but quality. So if we do make one or two changes, they need to come in and perform in the same vein and help the team."

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