Régis Le Bris confirms Sunderland injury situation and answers the big rotation question fans have been asking

Régis Le Bris has confirmed that he will have the same squad for Wednesday night’s trip to Luton Town.

The Sunderland head coach had been hopeful that Eliezer Mayenda and Dan Ballard might be able to return to the squad to bolster his options but speaking at his pre-match press conference on Tuesday, Le Bris said that neither had recovered in time to be part of the squad. Mayenda has an outside chance of returning against Oxford United this weekend but the trip to QPR is currently the most likely return date for both.

“We won’t have either of the two players for the Luton game,” Le Bris said.

“Eliezer is training. He has trained this week. The Oxford game might come a little bit too soon for him because it was a muscle injury so he needs a bit of time, but he should be available after that. For Ballard, it should be next week when he is able to get back up to full speed.”

Le Bris seems unlikely to make many if any changes to his side at Kenilworth Road, though when asked if he was tempted to rotate he said it was an ‘option’.

“We’ll see tomorrow. We have a core, I think. And the others are very involved even if they don’t play a lot at the minute. They are very involved and important and the starters feel they are around the team and ready to play. So it’s an option.”

Though changes tomorrow night look unlikely, Aaron Connolly’s addition to the squad gives Le Bris another option in the final third and that could mean at some stage Wilson Isidor moves out to the flanks.

“With Aaron now, we’ll have another option. We also have younger players who need minutes to improve - it’s not easy at the minute to start games. Eliezer could be possible because he did very well at the start of the season. Aaron gives us another option because we know that Wilson is versatile, he’s able to play on the left and right side. This is a new option for us with so many games.

“It could be an option (to play both together) because we have a lot of games coming up and a lot of different challenges. It is good for us to have those options.”