Elgin City set to welcome back three players for Saturday's cinch League 2 clash with Forfar Athletic at Borough Briggs as manager Barry Smith says his men are ready for action after two blank weekends
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Elgin City's threadbare squad will taken on their first match in October with three players back in contention for a place.
Since being thrashed 6-0 at Peterhead at the end of last month, City saw their home clash with Stenhousemuir postponed due to the wet weather - perhaps a blessing with just 14 players available.
They had to pull out of an Aberdeenshire Shield tie at Keith due to their player shortage, and another blank Saturday followed last week due to the international break.
Tomorrow's match will be their first at Borough Briggs for five weeks since surprisingly defeating title chasers Dumbarton 2-0.
"We can look back to the Dumbarton game when we were last at home and that was such a good result," said manager Barry Smith. "We want to keep that good record at home and keep picking up points."
Any optimism taken from that victory was dented by defeat to bottom club Clyde, then the Balmoor battering on September 30 which sent Elgin plunging to the foot of the League 2 table.
Three players who would have missed the Stenny fixture a fortnight ago have been putting some work in the training ground and will be part of the squad to face Forfar.
"Mitch Taylor has been able to get a couple of sessions in the last two weeks and although he's not played games, he should be available to be involved at some point on Saturday," Smith said.
"Matthew Cooper has done a lot more training than Mitch so he's available as well.
"Ben Barron has trained the past few sessions so although he was on the bench he is now fully fit."
On the other side of the coin, Ross County loan striker Matty Wright will be sidelined for a number of weeks due to a serious health scare.
And experienced midfielder Russell Dingwall could miss the rest of the year following a work-related accident earlier this month.
"Russell is out for the foreseeable future, he's long-term at the minute," Smith added. "He dislocated his elbow so it's just pain-based and movement-based and strength-based things that he can do just now.
"He's got a few hurdles to clear before he will be back in training.
"It's more important that Matty recovers properly so we won't put a time frame on that. His health is the most important thing."
The break from action has allowed Smith to put his squad to work on the Gleaner Arena park and work on some of the things that went so badly wrong in their last match at Peterhead.
"It's been good to get the boys on the training pitch. Nobody likes missing games and with the cup games last week it's ended up being a couple of weekends we've missed - that's the way it goes.
"I'm sure the boys will be eager to get back on the pitch and play 90 minutes.
"At training it has been good to bed down some ideas, but it's still early days. I'm trying to get across certain things and hopefully they will take it on board.
"You can work on things on the training pitch but it's when you go on to the pitch, that's what counts.
"For as much as we've had a lot of training sessions since our last game, obviously it's more important that when we get out on the pitch that we do what we are asked."
Smith briefly worked for tomorrow's opponents Forfar as assistant to former City manager Jim Weir.
When the weather put paid to Elgin's game against Stenny two weeks ago, Smith took the opportunity to watch the Loons in action against Peterhead - a match they lost 3-1.
He knows something of their dangers but also feels there are departments where City can trouble them.
"In the second half, Forfar were the better team and looked on the front foot, they got the ball forward quicker so we have to be aware of that.
"They've got a goalscorer and a threat in Josh Skelly and some good experience at the back in Andy Munro so they've got the basis of a good team there.
"They've got strengths and weaknesses and we just have to make sure that we play to our strengths and get in about their weaknesses.
"You want to win all of your home games and give the guys that come to the games something to be happy about and Saturday will be no different."
