The never-ending saga of the Nottingham Forest injury list

Here we are in limbo-land. No, not the 'in between Christmas and New Year' period - the 'in between owners' period. Yet, with Fawaz seemingly heading for the exit door and the Americans yet to formally arrive, someone has left on a stuck record playing out in the City Ground. Sadly, it's the all-too-familiar 'injury album' that we're hearing on loop.

Photo: Jack Torcello, Flickr

A month ago I tried to look at how our injury crisis compared to that of others. You can catch up with it here or, to save time, the conclusion was that yes, our injury situation does seem to be abnormally bad.

At that point 17 different first team squad players had suffered an injury this season. Since then we've seen Eric Lichaj, Joe Worrall, Henri Lansbury, Ben Osborn, Pajtim Kasami and Lica have all picked up injuries of varying degrees.

So, to recap, we're now up to 23 different players having suffered injuries after just 23 games. Even with my maths I can work out that that's one for every game. It's a number so high that Ceefax would have to spell it out with words.

It's now easier to list off the first team squad members who haven't been injured. I make it: Vladimir Stojkovic, Hildeberto Pereira, Jorge Grant, Nicolao Dumitru and Apostolos Vellios. Just five players yet to succumb to injury. Five players and counting.

It's also worth noting that I'm not even sure the five above haven't had a knock. Pereira has a handy suspension every few weeks to rest himself up while Grant and Dumitru are in and out of the matchday squad. If either of them were to be missing through injury we wouldn't know and neither of these players would ideally be named in a first choice XI or bench. Vellios is often 'rotated' too. Again, I've presumed this is based on preference not injury.

The injury farce is a motif for the shambolic running of the club. Recruitment has been poor, off-field solutions haven't been forthcoming and desperation on the pitch has presumably led to key players being rushed back. Just like the takeover, the injury crisis isn't over yet. See you next month for another whinge?