GARY Rowett says Mahlon Romeo is a big doubt to feature in the league opener against Stoke next Saturday – but Troy Parrott has a “very slight chance” against the Potters.
Romeo hasn’t featured in any pre-season friendlies and missed the 3-1 win at Crawley in the first round of the EFL Cup at the weekend.
The defender struggled with a groin problem towards the end of last season and though he is over the injury a lack of match action could count against him when Rowett picks his team to face Michael O’Neill’s side.
Jiri Skalak has trained after he missed the Crystal Palace friendly, but Ryan Woods can’t play against his parent club.
Parrott went off with a thigh strain in the 3-0 friendly win at Southend last Saturday week.
“Troy has a chance, though probably a very slight chance,” Rowett said. “He obviously pulled out of the Ireland squad and we felt it would be between three or four weeks. We’re not even two weeks into that yet.
“So we have to be a little bit careful, he’s a young player who’s come in and done a lot of work. We’ll see how he progresses.
“Mahlon is probably a little bit more doubtful. I’d imagine he’ll be training towards the back end of the week, but whether he’s had sufficient time on the pitch to be ready we’ll have to make a decision on that.
“Jiri pulled out of the Palace game, he felt his hamstring and I didn’t want to take that risk unnecessarily in the game. I wanted to have a look at Lenny [Ryan Leonard] out there as well and Lenny did really well. The fact that Jiri’s trained gives us more numbers.
“Jon Dadi Bodvarsson played 90 minutes against England – I don’t think he touched the ball that many times – but he certainly ran around.
“We’re in reasonable shape. We’ve got two or three we’d like to be involved but might not be.
“Woodsy’s not available to play against his parent club either. It gives us a couple of issues but nothing at this stage to worry about.”
Image: Millwall FC