Dennis Cirkin is expected to be fit when Sunderland resume their Championship campaign after the World Cup despite becoming the latest victim of the Black Cats' injury curse. Ahead of last night's game at Birmingham City, boss Tony Mowbray said he had fresh injury problems but refused to go into detail.
But left-back Cirkin was absent from the teamsheet at St Andrew's, and afterwards Mowbray revealed that the former Spurs defender had missed out with a calf injury. With Daniel Ballard, Aji Alese and Lynden Gooch also sidelined, and Luke O'Nien missing against Birmingham through suspension, Mowbray pointed out that he had an entire back five unavailable against the Blues.
Add into the mix leading scorer Ross Stewart and midfielder Edouard Michut, and it is clear that Sunderland have been badly hit by injuries in recent weeks and months. However, after this weekend's round of fixtures the Championship will pause for the World Cup and by the time Sunderland are next in action at home to Millwall on December 3, Mowbray expects to have Gooch, Alese, and Stewart back in contention, while O'Nien will be available again having served his one-match ban.
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"There's a whole back five unavailable at the moment if you think of Cirkin, Ballard, Alese, O'Nien, Gooch - that could be a back five quite easily, and a real good one, and yet they are all unavailable," said Mowbray. "Cirkin has a calf problem. I think it'll be two weeks, so I would hope that by Millwall on December 3 he will be back.
"Aji should be available as well, I think Ballard will be touch and go - it's probably too soon for him - but Gooch will definitely be available. It looks better.
"And I must say that Ross Stewart will probably be available as well, although he will be a bit like Ellis [Simms, who also recently returned from injury] in that he might be coming off the bench. It's good that the team is starting to come back, really, because there have been some pretty big footballers unavailable and the players deserve great credit for digging in and trying to find a way to win football matches."
In Cirkin's absence, Niall Huggins came into the side to play his first senior game after 14 months out through injury, and he lasted the full 90 minutes. And Trai Hume replaced O'Nien at right-back.
They helped Sunderland to a crucial win, with goals either side of half-time from Simms and Amad, in front of around 2,200 travelling fans. "Trai was amazing last night, and I have to mention Niall Huggins who hasn't played for over a year and only trained with the first team for one day and got through 90 minutes and did amazingly well," said Mowbray.
"I'm delighted for the players, and also for the fans. On a night like that you have to mention the supporters, because it's quite amazing to see that they fill their allocation every game and they sing and support their team.
"It's great when you can give them something to make them happy when they are driving home for four hours."
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