Harrogate Town defenders ruled out of trip to Oldham Athletic

The Sulphurites must make the trip across the Pennines to Boundary Park minus the services of experienced centre-half Rory McArdle and left-back Lewis Page.

Former Bradford City stalwart McArdle, who has started all nine of Town’s league matches this term, was replaced at half-time during last weekend’s goalless draw with Stevenage having tweaked a muscle in his groin.

Speaking immediately after the game, Harrogate manager Simon Weaver said that he was hopeful that the 34-year-old’s issue wasn’t too serious.

He told the Harrogate Advertiser: “Hopefully he’ll be back for next week, but it was nagging away at him during that first half and he is too big a player for us to risk anything.”

But it has subsequently been discovered that the damage to McArdle’s muscle is more severe than first thought, ruling him out for an unspecified period of time.

“He needs to see a specialist,” Weaver revealed.

“I can’t say exactly how bad it is or precisely how long we expect him to be out for yet, because we don’t know, but it’s swollen around his groin.

“He’s out of the Oldham game and might be missing for a few weeks after that.”

Page, 25, limped off in the first half of Town’s 2-0 defeat at Port Vale on September 18 with a hamstring strain, with the Sulphurites’ medical team initially expecting him to be back in contention for this weekend’s fixture.

But, it appears that his injury is also worse than first thought.

“Lewis Page is also probably looking at a few weeks,” Weaver added.

“It’s a blow for the lad because he was just getting going. It’s a shame for both the players and for us because they had been playing well.”