Rowett Monitoring Lawrence And Davies Groin Problems

Gary Rowett is hopeful that Tom Lawrence will overcome a ‘tight groin’ problem and be available for selection for Tuesday’s visit to Brentford.

The 23-year-old still managed to play the full 90 minutes in the 1-1 draw with Birmingham City on Saturday and the Derby County boss managed confirmed it isn’t a big problem.

Defender Curtis Davies also has the same problem.

The 32-year-old has been playing on with a groin injury the last few weeks and Rowett said he was monitoring the issue game-by-game.

Like Lawrence, though, the Rams’ boss is hoping he will be available once again when his side travel to Griffin Park.

The 43-year-old said: “I have checked this morning and Curtis (Davies) has had a groin niggle that he has been managing.

“He’s a typical experienced player who doesn’t want to say anything because he doesn’t want to come out of the team.

“His performances have not been impaired by it, but it’s something that we are just monitoring. Tom Lawrence, like Curtis, felt his groin become a bit tighter during the game on Saturday.

“He’s working incredibly hard in games and I have been really pleased with his application.

“He didn’t play with quite as much quality as he has been in the game on Saturday, but hopefully he will be ok for Tuesday.”

Rowett was also asked about what other changes he could make at today’s pre-match press conference.

He suggested before Saturday’s home match with Birmingham City that he would be making changes to his starting XI, regardless of the result outcome against the Blues.

Could one of those include Sam Winnall?

The 26-year-old, who is on a season-long loan from Sheffield Wednesday, stepped off the substitutes to score his first goal for the club in Saturday’s draw.

Rowett has confirmed that he is one of the players that is in his mind that could be drafted in to, in his words, ‘make a difference’.

“He’s a player that you would want to give an opportunity to do at some point anyway – that’s the case with all of the players that you bring in,” Rowett said.

“We’re not signing players to sit on the bench or to make the numbers up. We’re signing players to make a difference, so at some point you have got to give them the opportunity to be that difference.

“The difficulty with some players, when they haven’t played a lot of football, it’s hard for them to have that impact because they are not as match fit as they would like to be.

“Tomorrow night’s game will be an opportunity for some players to come back into the team and see if they can change what is, quite obviously, an away form that is not good enough.”