Raffa hangs his head in shame

United head in to the busy Festive period with just one injury worry as the squad returned to training this morning.

The players, who had been given two days off following the tough LDV game on Tuesday night, all reported in feeling fit, well and raring to go.

Paul Simpson explained, "we have a full squad to choose from, apart from me, which is a good position for us to be in. It's a busy period, obviously, and it is always better knowing that you have everyone available, should they be needed."

On his own injury he explained, "I was feeling fine until Raffa decided to lunge in on me during training this morning. He gave me a whack and it's not feeling too good at the moment. I may have to fine him ... heavily ... very heavily in fact ... just because I can!"

Kev Gray has recovered from a slight strain that he complained about during half time at Tranmere and Simon Grand has pulled through the cramp that dogged him during the last ten minutes of extra time. However, the mickey taking may take a while longer to overcome.

Michael Bridges is available again, having missed out due to being cup tied at Prenton Park, whilst talks continue to see whether he will be staying with the club beyond his current loan spell.

Simmo said, "I think everyone, the staff, the players and the fans, are looking forward to the 4 games ahead of us and particularly the match against Darlington on Monday. There is going to be a big crowd and if we do our job right, and play the way we know we can, then I know we'll be sending them all home with smiles on their faces. We'll enjoy our Christmas Day as much as we can, have another training session and then we'll be ready to go for the Boxing Day match."

Having watched the draw for the LDV this morning he added, "we wanted a home draw, so we have to be happy with that, and that's a fixture that we will start looking towards once we get over this run of games in the next ten days. No tie is easy at this stage of a knock out competition so we know that we'll have to approach it in the way that we have been going in to every game this season, do things properly and then, hopefully, that will bring the reward. Like I say, it's great to get a draw up here, that's good for our fans, but it's one that we will be looking at in closer detail once we have dealt with the very important League Two games that we are now going in to."