Motherwell boss dealt further blow with star out for 'sustained period'

Sam Nicholson has a knee problem while Filip Stuparevic has a hamstring complaint

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Motherwell boss Stuart Kettlewell has confirmed that midfielder Sam Nicholson is out for a “sustained period” with a knee injury.

Striker Filip Stuparevic is also crocked with a hamstring complaint that kept him out of this afternoon’s 0-0 Premiership opener at home to Ross County.

Kettlewell says a scan showed a problem with the patella tendon, and they’re just waiting to see what the prognosis is, but admits it’s not looking good.

He said: “Sam Nicholson had a real blow last night. After a scan it looks as if he’s going to be out for a sustained period of time, so we’re going to have to be creative in team selections to make sure we’ve got options in the front end of the park and I’m actively looking to try and see if we can bring in some fresh blood as well to give us more options at the top end of the park.

“We know if’s a long season, we need options and we need to cover what has been another spate of injuries for us.

“Nicholson’s injury is a problem with his patella tendon, his knee, and we will give a little bit of information as we move forward, but we’re still to get more clarity on what the next steps are.

“It’s the same one. We almost had him back on the pitch and then there was a set-back and there has been a scan.

“The recovery process and the steps that need to be taken are still not 100 per cent clear.

“Stuparevic is a hamstring, he pulled up the other day and that’s the only reason he’s not involved today.”

On the draw against the Staggies, Kettlewell admits his side needed to show their teeth in front of goal more.

He said: “We’re here to entertain and we’re here to score goals, and what we did last season in scoring plenty of goals was that we took more risks that what we probably took today.

“I have to go on record and say I stripped that back a bit from last week, because you feel the confidence is low and we had to make sure we were properly in a game.

“But we definitely have to be more ruthless, we need to put our strikers into positions, we definitely need to keep crossing balls into the box and carving out opportunities.

“You hear one or two murmurs of discontent, probably a lot of supporters felt we should have won it, same as myself.

“We had chances last season, we missed and trying to find your sharpness, and that kicked into gear, we had a player that was full of confidence, and I think we’ll get that again.”

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